Most of us are here because we have a relationship—either directly or by marriage—to John Stedman Holden. But who was this individual who brought us all to Bennington? None of us ever met him; yet we all came together to celebrate his life and meet one another.

John Stedman Holden was descended from Richard Holden, who left England as a religious dissenter in 1634 and settled in Watertown, Massachusetts. John, who was born in Charlton, MA, on May 9, 1845, was in the seventh generation to be born in the new world. His parents were Lewis and Eliza Howlett Holden. His paternal grandfather, Nathan Holden, was a farmer by occupation, and he and his wife had eleven children, all of whom lived to become adults. His maternal grandfather, John Howlett, was a native of Woodstock, CT, and a shoemaker by trade. John’s father, Lewis, was reared in the old family home in Barre, VT, and went to the public schools there. Later in life, he was engaged in shoe manufacturing and in farming. John was the fourth of his seven children.

John grew up in the Victorian era, having been born seven years after her ascension to the crown of England. In this country, it was a time of many changes. During his lifetime, fourteen states were admitted to the union, more than doubling its previous size. The country’s population also doubled, as did the number of industrial laborers and the gross national product. By the time he had graduated from school, the Civil War was over and the only other war during his lifetime would be the short Spanish-American War in 1898.

He witnessed the Gilded Age during which great fortunes were amassed by men like John D. Rockefeller, Andrew Carnegie, J. P. Morgan, Jay Gould, and Cornelius Vanderbilt. These magnates of industry (called “robber barons” by their critics) did things that wouldn’t be approved of now, but their methods were in conformity with contemporary practices. They worked hard and they played hard. Their vacation homes were the mansions of Newport and Jeckyll Island (which they called “cottages.”)

John lived at the perfect time for a man with his talents and entrepreneurial spirit. The Industrial Revolution had created opportunities unknown to earlier generations. The railroad system was well established and communications were advancing, with both the telephone and the typewriter first being shown at the Exposition of 1876. (Other items first seen at that event were ready-made shoes, linoleum floor coverings, canned foods, and dry yeast.)

After attending public schools in Charlton, John went on to Nichols Academy in Dudley, MA; Wesleyan Academy at Wilbraham, MA, and was prepared for a business career by a course in Eastman’s Business College in Poughkeepsie, NY.

When John was 18, his father died, leaving his mother with five young adults, but also two little girls, Lizzie and Anna. Many years later, Lizzie told her granddaughter that the first Christmas that John was the “man of the house,” he went up into the attic of their home to “talk with Santa” and came down bearing pieces of coal for the disappointed little girls. After some tears he went back up again, pleaded with Santa, and this time came down with two oranges. That, according to Lizzie, was their Christmas.

John had a widely-varied business career, starting soon after his father’s death as a clerk and roofer in Hartford, CT. At age 21 he became the youngest member of the Hartford Police Force. It was during this period that he married Jennie Goodell, whom some of us remember. Jennie, who was born on October 21, 1848, was the daughter of Cyrus and Almira Burr Goodell. Her mother was a sister of Alfred E. Burr, one of the early proprietors of the Hartford Times. Her father was an insurance agent.

What do I remember of Jennie, whom I called “Big Bamma?” Well, I have to confess that I remember the surroundings more than I do the person. She was always attired in rather drab clothing and seated in her rocking chair when I was taken to visit her. Two of her daughters, Aunt Alice and Aunty Lu, both widows by then, were living with her. The house at 213 West Main Street, now a funeral parlor, was built in 1867, prior to the time that the Holdens moved to Bennington. Although it was not a funeral parlor during Jennie’s lifetime, as far as I was concerned, it might as well have been. Through my young eyes, it was a dark and creepy place. The furniture was ponderous Victorian and the heavy drapes seemed to preclude the admission of any sun. There was even a velvet drape of some sort separating the formal parlor from the less formal, but even darker, sitting room. I’m sure that my great-grandmother was a lovely person, but to me at that time, the best thing she had going for her was a wonderful marble game! A grandniece who had more exposure to her than I did described her “as kind, but quite the Victorian.”

But back to John and his diversified career. He and Jennie left Hartford in 1871 and settled temporarily in Palmer, MA, where John and his brother Henry operated three stores and acquired some real estate referred to in one article I read as “tenements.” I had always considered this term derogatory or descriptive of buildings that had become run down; however, on a walking tour of Charleston a couple of weeks ago, I learned that it simply meant that the tenants paid to stay there. Then I saw the following definition in a book entitled “Victorian America,” “Tenements and apartments, terms often used synonymously, referred to dwellings designed to accommodate three or more separate sets of tenants, living independently of one another, under a single roof and doing their cooking on the premises.” So our ancestor was not necessarily a slum landlord.

John and Jennie’s first child, Arthur John Holden, was born on December 24, 1870, while they were still living in Hartford. He eventually married Frances Coleman and they had five children. While John and Jennie were in Palmer they had four more children. Alice, who was born on Feb. 6, 1872, became the wife of George Bickford, manager of the Woodbury Granite Company. Lulu made her appearance on Oct. 24, 1873, and was married to Norman Bassett, a judge and at one time Chief Justice of the Maine Supreme Court in Augusta. They had no children. Florence, who is the only one I don’t remember, was born on May 11, 1876. She married Theodore L. Thomas, sales manager for the Holden-Leonard Company, of which you will hear more later. They had four children before Florence’s untimely death in 1918. The last of John and Jennie’s children, Clarence Lewis Holden, was born on June 27, 1884. Clarence and his wife, Florence Spencer, had only three children, but they were the most prolific and produced the largest number of descendants.

Between the births of his last two children, John had a brief experience in the oil business. In 1859 Edwin Drake had struck oil in Titusville, PA, setting off a northeastern equivalent to the California gold rush. Oil wells were drilled all over western Pennsylvania with much of it being refined in Cleveland, Pittsburgh, or Buffalo. In 1879, John purchased the Crystal Oil Works at Miller’s Farm near Titusville. Its oil was refined on site. Thus John became owner and operator of an oil refinery. He faced tough competition! John D. Rockefeller, who along with a few others had formed the Standard Oil Company in Cleveland in 1870, had bought up all the other refineries in Cleveland and was looking further afield. He bought refineries in the Oil Cities of Pennsylvania as well as others in New York, Pittsburgh, and Philadelphia. John was in the business for only a year before he sold out to the Standard Oil Company. For the next two years, he did a wholesale trade in oil. In 1882 the stock in all the small companies was transferred to the Standard Oil Trust, and Standard Oil became the biggest name in the petroleum industry. By 1892, it had grown so large that the Federal Government dissolved the company under the Sherman Antitrust Act. which had been passed by Congress in 1890.

Following his stint in Pennsylvania, John returned to Palmer where he and Henry built and ran the operation of a woolen mill with the aid of a superintendent. Seven years later he sold his interest to his brother and Superintendent Fuller. Meanwhile, he had become financially interested in a wire mill, which employed three hundred operatives and was the largest industrial plant in Palmer. He disposed of his stock in this business in 1892.

In 1889, John, in association with Charles Leonard, bought the Hunt and Tillinghast woolen mills in Bennington. He and Jennie moved to Bennington the following year and purchased the John V. Hall House as their home. The “Big Mill,” as the business establishment was called, had been built in 1865 and originally used to make paisley shawls. When the paisley shawl industry folded, the mill was converted for knitted stockings as well as wool and cotton underwear and later was used for manufacturing ladies’ dress goods and cloth for men’s clothing. The mill was operated for three years under the name of John S. Holden Manufacturing Company. In 1892 John’s eldest son, Arthur, joined the company and the name was changed to the Holden, Leonard and Company. This company employed 350 men and also operated the Oneko Woolen Mills in New Bedford, MA, where it employed 300. As was typical of many mills in those days, there was an affiliated company store where the mill employees could run up a bill and have it deducted from their next pay. It carried about everything they might need: groceries, dry goods, boots and shoes, fruit, confectionery, cigars and tobacco, mill remnants, wall paper, and window shades.

Holden, Leonard and Company was not the only industry in town, although it did have the largest number of employees. The industrialization of Bennington began in 1850 with the establishment of the Stark Paper Company and over the next fifty years, many companies were added. A majority of them were related to the textile industry, but there were also manufacturers of soap, paper boxes, wax paper, and pulp and gunpowder machinery. With the creation of so many available jobs, the population of Bennington doubled from 1850-1900. Joe Hall is an authority on the history of Bennington and can tell you more later.

In 1897 John Holden and Harry J. Cushman bought the Bennington Banner. John appears to have been primarily an investor in this venture. Harry Cushman was the son of a former editor of the paper and, although the current editor, Charles W. Pierce, was going to continue in that capacity. Harry Cushman was going to dictate the policy and general management of the paper.

In that same year, 1897, with the Holden, Leonard Company running smoothly, John and Charles Leonard purchased the Woodbury Granite Company. John became president and was also a member of the directorate and largest stockholder. The two men also bought the Hardwick and Woodbury Railroad and John became president of that as well. He was also president of the Bennington National Bank.

But John Stedman Holden was not only interested in business. He was very active in the community as well. He was a Republican and served for one year as village president and four years as a trustee for his ward. In 1897 there was some sentiment for him to run for the nomination as the Republican candidate for Governor, but he indicated that he was not interested. Later, however, in 1906 he became a State Senator representing Bennington County, and, according to his obituary, “he was one of the leaders of the senate where he made an exceptional record.”¹ He was chairman of the Committee on Finance and served on the Committees on Rules and Street Railways.

John and his family were active members of the Second Congregational Church. Bennington’s original church, Old First Church, up on the hill, met the religious needs of the rural community during the first part of the 19^th century. Then the center of the area’s growing population shifted from the hill to down around the mills in the valley. Women, expected to carry their small children to several services a week, found the hike up the hill very taxing. Thus, the Second Congregational Church was established. John Holden served as one of its trustees. He also belonged to the YMCA and contributed $3,000 toward its new building. Other affiliations included the Mount Anthony Country Club, the Masons, the Bennington Club, and the Bennington Battle Monument and Historical Association.

It is obvious from all that I have said that John was a man of many interests and had the talent to pursue them. One article described him as “a man of resourceful business ability, who formed plans readily and accurately and with almost unfailing judgment…He always carried forward to successful completion whatever enterprise he undertook. An employer of many people in Bennington, he built up the town’s largest industry, for which he was mainly responsible, and was a man who did more than most individuals to advance the interests of his fellowmen.”² It was said that he enjoyed the esteem of everyone who knew him and that he was well-liked by his employees.

John suffered some health problems in early 1907, but seemed to be improving so set out on a winter trip to Mexico and California, accompanied by his wife and son Clarence. While in Pasadena, he suffered a stroke and died there on March 22, 1907, at the age of 61. Obituaries in those days were rather flowery and his was no exception. It said in part:

Not a native of Bennington, or even of Vermont, he came here at the psychological moment of his life when the strength of his manhood and ability as a businessman were ready for the development of a career remarkable in its fruition. Shocked as we all are, his end seems typical of the man. Dying suddenly in middle age when he apparently had many years of active business life ahead, his passing is like the fall of the mighty oak of the forest unwarned, unchallenged and with few signs of decay to presage the end.

We speak of a man’s dying at the height of his career and in one sense this applies to Mr. Holden, but no in the greater and stronger meaning. He was one of the strong, aggressive, self-reliant men who, when he once laid hands on a matter of business, of sentiment, or public spirit, carried it steadily forward to the result which he himself demanded. Then and not until then did he lay it aside or yield it into other hands. With this characteristic, his life has been one of well-defined, advancing, upward steps, each one complete and almost independent of the others though grounded on the same foundation.

Like all successful men in business life, he was possessed of indomitable courage, unswerving perseverance, quick insight and broad grasp. But he was more than that. Bennington had no more loyal citizen than he; the church of which he was a member had no more earnest communicant, and the many for whom he cared had no more loyal friend than he. It is impossible to do him justice within the confines of a brief newspaper sketch. The life and the business in which he was engaged connect him so closely with his neighbors and fellow citizens that there is perhaps not a home in Bennington which does not today feel as though it had met with a direct and tangible loss.³

I think we can all be proud of our distinguished ancestor. It is amazing to reflect upon all that he did in one relatively short lifetime. And I think he would be honored and pleased that we care enough about our heritage to come together this way.