Pat Mills Interview

Interview with Pat Mills

April 1, 2023 Memorial Stadium Champaign, IL

Interviewer: Frank Cabrera FC=Frank Cabrera PM=Pat Mills

FC: So just for policies, could I have you state your name and the date? My name is ? And I’m interviewing you today on April 1st at 4:37 P.M. on a Saturday, 2023.

PM: My name is Pat Mills and the date is April 1st, 19- 2023, at what time? 4:37.

FC: April 1st, thanks so much. So you want to tell us about your story about being involved with the Farm Aid concert? How you got involved? Who got you involved? What were you going through throughout the entire process, anything that you feel compelled that needs to be known for the Farm Aid concert experience to be found?

PM: Well, just a fan of music and this wide array of people coming, one for a good cause, but as well as music fans. It’s great to see bands that I loved, but also bands that I would like to see because they just belonged to be seen, like a lot of the country-western band folks that – I don’t really follow that kind of music, but here are the illuminaries.

FC: Yes

PM: So we got to see a wide range – array – of music, So it’s just an exciting time for Champaign and also for the farming community, which, obviously we live in downstate Illinois, we’re a big part of, even if you’re not farmers. So actually, we came with my wife and a couple of friends, and I didn’t get over here until about 11. I think it was raining there in the early morning, so I think we missed that part until it kind of cleared up about 11 and just wandered the area. I’m sure you’ve heard a lot about this but folks were on the field covering up, the tighter the crowd was closer to the stage, but a lot of times we’d wander in as close as we could get, just to catch somebody from a little bit better vantage point, but we also enjoyed the space as we moved back out of that, and sometimes we’d wander up to the upper bleachers and get that better vantage point. I think we probably stayed till just about closing, I think as Willie Nelson’s band was playing their last set. I think it was after midnight when we left. That was kind of neat, we’d left the stadium, but we’d seen him. He was onstage at numerous times during the day. So anyway, that’s the whole day, so it’s just more of the experience of being here, my three or four memories that were the ones that were just personal to me, but I’m sure there were so many instances like that for other people, just stories of the day, where, one of them we were listening to Joni Mitchell, who we love, and we were in the upper deck, late afternoon, just listening to this beautiful voice floating over the stadium and the piano going, and next to us was a bunch of students, so we’re older, we were 30, and they’re all going ‘this sucks, this sucks, we want Sammy Hagar” and we just cracked up at that. But that was right when “I Can’t Drive 55” was a big hit and that was his first performance with, what’s the name of that band? I can’t remember. I’m blanking, cut that part out. But I do also remember during the day I had – I'm a runner and I had a PC Road Race t-shirt, which is now a 60,000 person race, 10K race, the whole of Atlanta, Georgia every July 4th, and I’m from Atlanta, but I live here – I’ve lived here since the ‘80s - but somebody came up to me and said ‘I saw your shirt’ and it turned out she was a reporter for the Atlanta Journal Constitution, so she said ‘what do you think about this?’ and I said ‘it’s really cool’, about like that, and so it was a very short interview, and when she left my friends said ‘you are never going to get quoted in that paper, you should’ve said something like “it’s the Woodstock of the ‘90s, or the ‘80s”’ - but he was right. But that, and just seeing – again, I followed the bands, I remember hearing Don Henley doing “Sunset Grill”, which is a really cool song right at dusk, so that was really cool, at sunset and the music was flowing and that was a really impressionable point in time. Those were sort of the major memories, just the crowd, everybody was really enjoing the day and that’s incredible; it was great to be a part of it.

FC: If you could name any names, anybody who went with you, I know you spoke, you went with your family, your daughter, your wife, you’ve heard a lot today, so is there anything you want to commemorate toward them, say anything for them? A lot of this stuff is going to be happening in two-years, at the fourtieth anniversary in two years, at the Spurlock Museum, so anything you want or feel compelled that should be there? You mentioned Willie Nelson as well?

PM: Well, we all enjoy the same kind of music and I don’t think I could add anything that she would, you know, I don’t know any of her particular stories aren’t the ones I would have told, I think, so.

FC: Well, thanks so much. We’ll end the recording here, so you want to just say the time again, and a date for me?

PM: April 1st, 2023, 4:43. FC: Thank you so much.

PM: Yep.

This set of recordings is of a range of participants in the Farm Aid concert of 1985, and is to be used only for historical research and educational purposes. Interviews were conducted with the express written consent of all participants. This collection was compiled by the Champaign County History Museum and the Spring 2023 History Harvest class at the University of Illinois. These recordings are presented with transcripts of their contents.