Born in Vancouver, Robert Mills Clark earned a B.Comm. (1941) and B.A. (1942) at UBC. He completed an M.A. (1944) and Ph.D. (1946) at Harvard University. Clark began his career at UBC as a lecturer in the Department of Economics in 1946. Specializing in provincial and municipal taxation, he wrote The Municipal Business Tax in Canada in 1952, and in 1959 his two-volume report, Economic Security for the Aged in the United States and Canada, was published by the federal government. Clark also served on three provincial commissions of inquiry on public finance issues. Actively involved in the university's administration, he was appointed as University Planner in 1966. Clark headed the Planning Office (later known as Academic Planning and then Institutional Analysis and Planning) until 1976. He also served on the UBC Senate and Board of Governors, the Vancouver School of Theology, and Regent College and was an active member of The Vancouver Board of Trade. He retired from the Department of Economics in 1985. In 1992 Clark was awarded the Confederation Medal by the federal government for outstanding service to the people of Canada. He died on 11 August 2007.