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| The Holt family plot at Oahu Cemetery, Honolulu, Hawaii |
In 1954 Clarice B. Taylor wrote up a series of articles
about the Holt family in Hawaii and had them published in the Honolulu Star-Bulletin from June 3rd
to September 11th. These
stories are based on the history of the Holt family from Robert William Holt
(1792 – 1862) born in England, married first in New England, and removed to
Hawaii, married second to a native Hawaiian, and beyond as the numbers of descendants grew and grew. They are not based on fact or proven by
genealogical standards, but are a fun read because they are stories, not just
dates, places and names.
Lisa Ululani Holt, a descendant, has transcribed all “The Fabulous Holts” articles and made
them available as a PDF file. As she
states in her forward “Families all have their stories. Much like the game‚ "telephone‚" where you
whisper something to one person and it moves down the line, those stories can
get distorted. Such are the stories of
the Holts.”
As Lisa, and other Holt descendants, and myself (a relative
of Robert William Holt’s first wife, Ann Marie Stanwood Jones (1811 – 1832) )
all work on the Holt family genealogy, this document holds important clues as
we sift through all the story details for facts, myths, and narratives. For example, in Chapter 2, on page 2, it
mentions that Robert William Holt left England for Boston, Massachusetts to be
with a sister, Mary, around 1800. This is questioned on page 23. Actually, Mary was the sister of his bride,
Ann Marie. So the story was true, just a
little bit twisted over time. This is
part of the story that I helped to “untwist”, since my 4th great grandmother
Catherine Plummer Jones was the sister to both Mary and Ann Marie and five
other siblings- many of these Boston born siblings had ties to Hawaiian
history.
I have a word file of a transcription of “The Fabulous Holts” written up by Holt descendant Sheri
Iona about a dozen years ago, and I donated a printed copy to the NEHGS manuscript
department. Some of the resources listed
below were also donated to NEHGS as part of a large genealogy of the Jones,
Dominis and Holt families. I don’t know
if there has ever been a published version of “The Fabulous Holts”, other than the original newspaper articles.
Note: as you are
reading through these articles, please note that there are no articles 65 and
74. The numbering system was in error as
these were published in the Honolulu
Star-Bulletin
Click this link for a PDF file of “The Fabulous Holts” transcribed by Lisa Ululani Holt:
Other Holt Family resources:
Recollections: Memoirs of John Dominis Holt 1919 - 1935 by John
Dominis Holt, Ku Pa’a Publishing, Honolulu, Hawaii, 1993. Also at the NEHGS library in the 7th
floor stacks.
Robert William Holt: Founder of the Holt Family in Hawaii, by
John Dominis Holt, Topgallant Publishing, Co, Hawaii, 1988 (my copy was purchased
at the Bishop Museum in Honolulu, Hawaii) A copy is at the NEHGS library in the
7th floor stacks.
There was a Holt Genealogy manuscript written in 1974
compiled by Kaala Richardson Ridley, and expanded with notes by Sheri Iona in
2008. It was never published in book
form, but has been distributed to members of the family. I donated a copy to NEHGS and it is available
in the manuscript department.
Hawaii’s Holts Facebook group https://www.facebook.com/groups/253651931332203/
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The URL for this post is
http://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2014/12/the-fabulous-holts.html
Copyright © 2014, Heather Wilkinson Rojo
Kemilia Kaopua Holt was my Great great grand aunt and Clarisse Taylor was the mother of a good friend and co-teacher at Kalani High School in Honolulu.
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