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About

Since 1901, Mills & Mills Funeral Home in Tumwater, Washington, has served the community with a full array of funeral and memorial services. For more than a century, we have upheld a tradition of providing personal and compassionate funeral care to Olympia-area families. 

Mills & Mills Memorial Park is a peaceful final resting place for the people of Tumwater and the surrounding area. It's designed to be a serene and calming location that features the natural beauty of Washington. Working together, the funeral home and cemetery allow you to handle everything from funerals and memorial services to burials and memorial markers.

 

 

Your dedicated funeral provider

We understand that losing a loved one is an emotional and difficult experience. Mills & Mills Funeral Home is a warm, welcoming environment with services designed to help you through one of the most personal and challenging stages of life.

Our welcoming facility offers a full kitchen, spacious foyer and chapel with robust video and audio capabilities.

Whether you wish to arrange for a traditional funeral or a celebration of life ceremony, plan to have a large gathering or would like a more intimate service, our team will work with you 1-on-1 to ensure your needs, wishes and budget are met. It is our promise to provide you with the utmost care and to create a ceremony that is special and meaningful.

Mills & Mills Memorial Park

The sister location to the funeral home, Mills & Mills Memorial Park is a beautiful cemetery surrounded by wooded land. Within our cemetery grounds, you'll find the Pacific Northwest spirit alive and thriving. We specifically care for and maintain many special trees and plants: giant sequoias, maples, pines and an 88-foot-tall American chestnut tree—the largest in the Pacific Northwest and renowned as the largest healthy member of its species in the United States.

Currently, only 18 of the memorial park's 32 acres are developed for cemetery use. The remaining land remains open for future gardens, features and generations. The cemetery currently maintains 10 gardens for ground burial, each with its own special features. We have a mausoleum for above-ground entombment and various niche walls for cremation urn placement.

We keep a full-time, year-round crew to care for our serene cemetery. Even in the lull of winter, we remain dedicated to the highest quality care of our lawns, trees, shrubs and plants.

WHV 2020 - Level 1 We honor veterans

Mills & Mills Funeral Home & Memorial Park understands the unique needs of America’s veterans and their families. As a Level One Founding Community Partner with We Honor Veterans, our staff is knowledgeable in the benefits available to veterans and their families. With respect, integrity and dignity, we will walk you through the steps of creating a veteran's memorial service that truly honors the life and sacrifice of your loved one.

Contact us, day or night

Both the funeral home and cemetery offer services founded on respect, dependability and integrity. We welcome you to come by for a tour of the cemetery grounds and modern funeral home where you can also meet the friendly funeral home and cemetery teams.

Community events

In addition to the services we provide at the funeral home and cemetery, we also invite the community to join us periodically throughout the year for various events. Every year, we host a Memorial Day program to honor those who have served our country. On Halloween, we host an evening Countdown to Candy event. We also invite the public to attend our Light The Night luminary event during the holiday season. It is our hope that these events will bring a sense of comfort and community to families who are grieving.

History

Mills & Mills began at the turn of the century when William R. Whiteside, an undertaker from St. Louis, Missouri, settled in Olympia, Washington, and built the original facility at what is now 414 S. Franklin St. in 1901. This historic building, except for some slight modifications and remodeling (in 1928, 1954 and 1980), remains mostly in its original form.

In 1906, the Whiteside family moved operations to the then more promising area in Grays Harbor and sold the business to Louis J. Sticklin of Chehalis, Washington. Louis was originally a cabinetmaker and started his 1st funeral home in Morris, Pennsylvania. In 1890, he came to the Pacific Northwest and set up shop in Chehalis. The Sticklin Undertaking Company operated the business until 1915, when it was sold to Jesse T. Mills.

Family passion

Jesse T. Mills was a colorful character in Olympia and served as the city sheriff from 1900 to 1903 and mayor from 1917 to 1920. In 1919, he brought his nephew Arley D. Mills into the business of Mills Funeral Parlors. In the mid-1920s, the uncle-nephew team changed the name to Mills & Mills Funeral Home.

Jesse died in 1943, and Arley brought an old friend, Lawrence O. “L.O.” Swenson, into the business as a partner. This arrangement lasted until Jesse died in 1956 and Lawrence took over as the sole owner of the business. The business was then sold to Dan L. McCaughan in 1963. He held proprietorship until January 1980, when he sold the business to Doug and Barbara Twibell. The business had been known as Mills & Mills Funeral Service. In the following years, the name evolved to Mills & Mills Funeral Directors and later to Mills & Mills Funeral Home.

Standing strong

Aside from necessary updates and repairs, the historic Franklin Street building stood steady and served the needs of our team and client families for many years. On February 28, 2001, a 6.5-magnitude earthquake centered in the Nisqually Delta hit the Olympia area. The building rocked and moved with the rest of downtown Olympia. Unfortunately, the building sustained substantial damage and the business was moved to Olympic Memorial Gardens on Littlerock Road. On September 11, 2005, the new building was dedicated under its current name.

Amenities

Location

Cremation

Service

Religious & Cultural

Other

Plan a Simple Cremation

Simple can still mean exceptional. Let us show you how.

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Express your sympathy with flowers & gifts

1-800-Flowers

View arrangements

Bouquet of flowers on a cemetery 

Remember the one you love

Honor the memory of your loved one with cemetery flower placement. You choose the flowers. You choose the months. We do the rest.

Learn More
Floral component background

Express your sympathy with flowers & gifts

1-800-Flowers

View arrangements

Bouquet of flowers on a cemetery

Remember the one you love

Honor the memory of your loved one with cemetery flower placement. You choose the flowers. You choose the months. We do the rest.

Learn More

Express your sympathy with flowers & gifts

View arrangements
Floral component background

Express your sympathy with flowers & gifts

1-800-Flowers

View arrangements

Vintage photos scattered

Unable to find an obituary?

Not finding what you are looking for? Search for your loved one's obituary across any of our other locations.

VIEW OBITUARIES
Floral component background

Express your sympathy with flowers & gifts

1-800-Flowers

View arrangements

Vintage photos scattered

Unable to find an obituary?

Not finding what you are looking for? Search for your loved one's obituary across any of our Washelli locations.

VIEW OBITUARIES
A beautiful bouquet of flowers

Express your sympathy with flowers & gifts

 1-800-Flowers

View Arrangements
Bouquet of flowers on a cemetery

Remember the one you love

Honor the memory of your loved one with cemetery flower placement. You choose the flowers. You choose the months. We do the rest.

Learn More
Vintage photos scattered

Unable to find an obituary?

Not finding what you are looking for? Search for your loved one's obituary across any of our other locations.

VIEW OBITUARIES

Ratings & Reviews

Verified Customer Reviews

Since 2005, many of our customers have taken the time to tell us how we did each year via our Voice of the Customer program. Our star ratings and comments from families come directly from these surveys.

"Through out the whole process, all of the staffs who were evolved did an outstanding job to help ease our family through the hard time. Tiffany, Doris and everyone else who helped were very professional, considerate, accommodating with our needs and wanted."

jd-power-verified-checkmark Verified Customer

September 2021

"We used Tumwater Mills and Mills in January for my mom and September for my Dad. Paul at Mills and Mills Tumwater was very thorough, kind and explained everything. His staff did our moms appearance and she was beautiful-a pleasant final memory that was so appreciated! Paul went above and beyond and made sure we had everything we needed for my Dads service. When he said not to worry about something-he would take care of it-I knew his follow through was excellent from our experience earlier this year. The staff is very professional and anytime I called needing something, they got right back to me. I would highly recommend Tumwater Mills and Mills!"

jd-power-verified-checkmark Verified Burial & Memorial Service Customer

September 2021

"I am a grieving senior citizen single mother who tragically lost her only son, a disabled young man. Mills and Mills helped me in all ways to make the handling of my son's remains a reverend and healing experience. The continuity of care with our funeral director Dan Compton was extraordinary, and I truly mean that. Dan told me from the beginning that the people that come to Mills and Mills for service become their family, I truly now believe that. In every way, through every procedural, Dan treated my family as family. I had only a direct cremation with no added services asked for or used. And yet, Mills and Mills with Dan as our family's liaison, treated our family's needs for my son as if we were having an elaborate service rendered from the funeral home. Our needs were the least being served as if we were the most. There can be no more proof of the value of Mills & Mills in all ways of integrity than this. I thank them and will always thank them til the day I pass, for their help."

jd-power-verified-checkmark Verified Cremation Customer

July 2021

"The loss of my little 94 year old mother was HUGE. I was really struggling with no only losing her but having to face dealing with the funeral home. Both my mother and my dad had prepaid for their end time care so I didn't have to worry about any of that it was just the finishing touches for most recently my little mother. Such a rough thing to do but Dan and Doris made it so easy and actually brought a smile to my face and made my heart feel a little better. If I have to deal with loss and/or losing a family member ever again I will definitely come to Mills and Mills in Tumwater, WA as they have literally been nothing short of amazing in this time of great sadness. I can't speak highly enough about them and how they went about their jobs."

jd-power-verified-checkmark Verified Customer

July 2021

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