Dr Nancy Millis - Infinite Women

Born: 10 April 1922, Australia
Died: 29 September 2012
Country most active: Australia
Also known as: NA

The following is republished with permission from the Victorian Honour Roll of Women.

The contributions that Professor Nancy Millis made to agriculture, protection of the environment, science, medicine and engineering were immense.

Without her leadership, genetic engineering would not have flourished in Australia. Born in the Melbourne suburb of Brighton in 1922, Nancy Millis was the fifth of six children, whose enlightened parents made sure the family was well educated even during the Depression. Her father’s ill health meant Nancy had to leave school at 16, but she went to night school and matriculated and then studied Agricultural Science at the University of Melbourne.

In 1948 she went to England to obtain her PhD at the University of Bristol and did her thesis on the fermentation of cider, her introduction to industrial process technology. On her return to Australia she was appointed Lecturer in the Microbiology Department at the University of Melbourne and a Professor in 1982.

Nancy’s main leadership was in the introduction of genetic engineering to the fledgling field of biotechnology in Australia. The first course in biotechnology at the University of Melbourne was taught by Nancy to chemical engineering students. From 1980 to 2000, she chaired the Federal Government’s genetic engineering surveillance committees (RDMC and GMAC), which set up guidelines that have become models for most of the South-East Asian region.

Nancy Millis was also a leader in the environmental management field. She was aware early of the importance of the purity of water and one of her main projects was the development of techniques to treat excess or wastewater after industrial use.

Professor Millis served on a wide range of committees and boards. Her integrity, persistence, forthrightness and the ability to collaborate with others to achieve a successful outcome are some of her outstanding characteristics. She had great skill in determining the path science should take and leads others to follow. In 1992, Professor Millis was appointed the first woman Chancellor of La Trobe University. She was Chair of the Victorian Government’s Water Strategy Committee that advised on the supply and use of water for the Melbourne area. In 1977, she became a Member of the British Empire (MBE) and in 1990 was made a Companion of the Order of Australia (AC).

In 2002, Nancy and her work was honoured and recognised by being part of the Australia Post Legend Stamp series. Nancy Millis was someone with the rare combination of having scientific knowledge, industrial application and the ability to liaise with political, business, educational and scientific workers not only in Australia, but worldwide. Her knowledge and advice was greatly appreciated by her many students over four decades of lecturing and PhD supervision.

The following is republished from The Encyclopedia of Women and Leadership in Twentieth-Century Australia. Written by Rosemary Francis, The University of Melbourne. See below for full attribution.

Nancy Millis was born in Melbourne on 10 April 1922, the fifth in a family of six children. The family lived in Brighton and operated a wholesale fruit business. Nancy received her primary and secondary education at Brighton primary and Melbourne Church of England Girls’ Grammar School. Her education was interrupted when her father suffered a heart attack and she left school to work as a bookkeeper. She completed her matriculation at night school part-time, and as a result of taking two years to matriculate, was prevented from enrolling in the Bachelor of Science degree at the University of Melbourne. After overcoming severe illness, on her sister Jean’s advice, she completed the Bachelor of Agricultural Science instead in 1945 and Master of Agricultural Science in 1946.

The completion of her PhD at the University of Bristol in 1952 on the fermentation of cider and microrganisms that affect the process, laid the basis for her academic career and leadership in the field. On her return to Melbourne in 1952, she was to experience gender discrimination, when she was unsuccessful at finding employment with Carlton and United Breweries and Kraft; neither of which employed women in their laboratories. By 1953 she had a position at the University of Melbourne as a Demonstrator in the microbiology department. In 1956 she was appointed as a lecturer, following the award of a Fulbright travel grant in 1954. Her research into fermentation was extended when she took sabbatical leave in 1963 to work with Suichi Aiba at the Institute of Applied Microbiology at Tokyo University. This work formed the foundation of the course Millis subsequently established at Melbourne and the lectures she gave in Tokyo with Aiba and Arthur Humphrey form the basis of Biochemical Engineering, first published in 1965 and still a standard textbook in the field.

In 1977, in recognition of this work and her leadership in the field, she was elected to the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering (ATSE). She was promoted to a Professorship in 1982, only the fourth woman to be appointed professor at the University of Melbourne, and remained in that position until her retirement in 1987. On her professorial appointment, she remarked to The Age newspaper that universities could be ‘a bit of a club where blokes tend to appoint blokes … And there is a tendency for women not to want to take on responsibility, but that’s partly because sometimes they are invited to take responsibility in such a way that they can’t say yes’ (quoted in Morrison). In 1988 she was made Emeritus Professor and in 1993 was awarded an Honorary Doctorate at the University of Melbourne. She was Chancellor of La Trobe University from 1992 until 2006.

In 2002 Millis was one of five Australian scientists featured on Australian stamps. Two years later she was elected to the Australian Academy of Science (AAS). Complementing her academic leadership, Millis served on the Board of Management of the Fairfield Infectious Diseases Hospital and the Australian Water Advisory Resources Committee, among others. She died in Epworth hospital, Richmond, on 29 November 2012.

Work cited
Rosemary Francis, ‘Millis, Nancy Fannie’, in The Encyclopedia of Women and Leadership in Twentieth-Century Australia, Australian Women’s Archives Project, 2014, https://www.womenaustralia.info/leaders/biogs/WLE0664b.htm, accessed 16 January 2022.