In the age of the “Roaring Twenties,” philanthropists Mary Louise Milliken and her husband Samuel Canning Childs embarked on a charitable spree that impacted communities across the world. In a stunning act of benevolence, the Childs donated funds for over twenty hospitals, two churches, several orphanages, and a singular community building that would benefit the community of Mary Louise’s youth and serve as a center for educational, social, and civic programming. Designed by the Dean of the Yale School of Architecture George Simpson Koyl of the architecture firm Marr & Holman, and designed in the era’s fashionable Colonial-Revival style, the Milliken consists of over 13,000 square feet of grand spaces that continue to serve the community in elegance and beauty.
On September 20th 1873, Mary Louise Milliken was born to Benjamin Hord Milliken and Mary Rebecca Wells at the Irving home on West Main Street in Elkton, Kentucky.
After learning that her brother Samuel Horace Wells was sick from tuberculosis in Elkton, Mary Rebecca, or “Beck” as the family called her, travels to Elkton to nurse her brother back to health from Tuberculosis. Within weeks, Mary contracts the disease leading to her untimely demise, leaving behind her five young children and husband. Mary Louise Milliken, the eldest of the children takes on the role of her deceased mother, raising her four siblings Louis, Horace, Caroline, & Lillian alongside her father Benjamin.
In 1924, Mary Louise Milliken’s sister Caroline takes on the role of caring for Benjamin Milliken so that Mary Louise could marry Samuel Canning Childs. “Canning” was a multi-millionaire through his business prowess as the co-owner of the Child’s Grocery Store chain. The couple made their residence in Camden, New Jersey.
Beginning around the mid-1920s, Canning began the process of commissioning public buildings. His first works were churches, hospitals, and together, he and Mary Louise planned for the donation of the first privately-donated “Community House” in the United States.
Working with architect the Yale School of Architecture Dean George Koyl and Marr & Holmann of Nashville, Tennessee, Mary Louise Milliken directed that the building be programmed for use as a community gathering place and house a library, theater, and banquet hall. When the design was completed, the building contained over 13,000 square feet of public use space containing state-of-the-art heating systems, plumbing, and electricity set in the Colonial-Revival style.
In a two-day celebration, the building opened to national acclaim. The Francis Craig Orchestra played for the second day’s ball held in the building’s banquet hall. The Governor of Kentucky, and Supreme Court Justice was in attendance, as well as over 500 attendees from the local community and beyond.
In 1928, the building was given to the Milliken Memorial Community House Association. Their first mission was to fill the building’s library with books from current and former Elktonians. A letter writing campaign proved successful and the county’s first public lending library was created completely by donations.
In 1936, Mary Louise Milliken Childs passed away in Riverside, California. By the end of her life, she and her husband Canning had donated two churches, funding for 20 hospitals, and the Milliken Memorial Community House. Her final wishes were to be interred in her beloved Elkton near her family. She rests aside both her parents and many later generations of the Milliken family.
In 1873, Mary Louise Milliken Childs was born in the small town of Elkton to Benjamin Hord Milliken and Mary Rebecca Wells Milliken of Paducah, Kentucky. In the 1870s, Elkton was a well developed city that possessed fine schools, churches, and was inhabited by several multi-generational families that often achieved success on a national stage. For these reasons, and perhaps nostalgic ties to her hometown, Rebecca Wells traveled to Elkton to be placed under the care of her family at the Wells/Perkins family home on West Main Street in Elkton for the birth of all five of her children.
The Milliken is led by a donation and volunteer based membership and a Board of Directors. The organization offers social and educational programming for the safety, health, and wellbeing of the community.