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Friday, December 26, 2014

“The Fabulous Holts”

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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http://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2014/12/the-fabulous-holts.html
Copyright © 2014, Heather Wilkinson Rojo


1 comment:

  1. 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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