She would have become the First Lady of Virginia when her husband Francis Pickens Miller ran (unsuccessfully) in the Democratic primary in 1949 against the Byrd Organization candidate John S. Battle.
Hill then traveled across the Atlantic Ocean to study in Europe, including at Oxford University (from which she received a diploma in Economics and Political Science in 1922, as well as began the courtship described below).
Following their marriage, Miller and her Kentucky-native husband moved to then-rural Fairfax County, Virginia in 1929, buying a 10 acres and reconstructing an old tavern scheduled for demolition on their property, which they operated as a dairy farm and which later became Flint Hill School and still later was acquired by AT&T.
She then accepted a staff position with the United States Department of Agriculture, across the Potomac River in Washington, D.C., writing articles as well as speeches and press releases intermittently until 1940.
Although her husband lost in the Democratic primary to Byrd Organization loyalist John S. Battle (who won the gubernatorial election in 1949), he ran again, this time for the U.S. Senate seat occupied by powerful and long-time U.S.
Miller also served on the governing boards of George Mason University and Bryn Mawr College, and was among the first women admitted to Washington's exclusive Cosmos Club.
[citation needed] Following her husband's retirement, the Millers divided their time between houses in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. and Kitty Hawk, North Carolina.