Oregon Historical Quarterly/Volume 28/Frederick V. Holman: An Appreciation
THE
Oregon Historical Quarterly
VOLUME XXVIII SEPTEMBER, 1927 NUMBER 3
Copyright, 1923, by the Oregon Historical Society The Quarterly disavows responsibility for the positions taken by contributors to its pages
FREDERICK V. HOLMAN
An Appreciation
By N. J. LEVINSON
Editorial Writer, Portland Telegram
How far should a man go when request comes to write an estimate of a friend who recently lay down to his long sleep? I put the inquiry to myself a few days ago when Professor Young asked me to express formally in print my opinion of the late Frederick V. Holman, former president of the Oregon Historical Society. My reply was that I ought to write almost without restraint; therefore, I feel free to tell the truth as I see it. If I should repeat a few things that were in my mind when I penned an appreciation, published in the Portland Telegram under the initials N. J. L., I hope not to be criticized. What follows will not be a tabloid biography of a native son well known in person, or by repute, to every reader of the Quarterly. My purpose is to speak of his altruistic service to the state of Oregon, to set forth a few reasons why we should honor his memory, and to extol his high character. Candor compels me to say that I am writing, not in the spirit of some future impartial biographer, but with an unmistakable bias in favor of my subject. Any living pioneer contemporary or old timer whose life had been enriched by close contacts with him could not do otherwise. Emotion would color his utterances, just as it colors mine.
A superior brain was one of Fred Holman's precious inheritances. Uncommon intellectual industry was another. Thirst for knowledge came in early childhood, and it in creased constantly with the growth of years. He learned thoroughly the principles of sound thinking during his four year course at the University of California when it was richly equipped with a staff of men eminent as character builders as well as scholars. He cultivated sound thinking systematically under their daily leadership. This was at a time when the University of Oregon had scarcely developed into a good high school. When he attained middle age he was appointed a regent of Oregon's leading institution of higher learning. Well qualified, he discharged his high duties with signal ability. In him were combined high character, high education and high public spirit which was ever active.
Law was his vocation; Oregon history his avocation. In both he won marked success. He practiced the one for material gain; he indulged in the other out of pure love. Additional to general knowledge of the beginnings of civilization in the "Oregon Country," he devoted himself to painstaking study of points in dispute which cover the period between John Jacob Astor's fur trading post in 1811 and the launch ing of the provisional government at Champoeg in 1843. Mr. Holman was not by nature a controversialist. His mind was honest. He kept it open. He wanted facts, and he searched for them wherever they could be found. He bumped into controversies—many of them. This was inevitable. He was not able to take and maintain a neutral stand. His intellectual training compelled him to form positive opinions. These disputed points are still in dispute. Prejudice is not absent from either side. I venture to say that Mr. Holman's opinions are much more free from prejudice than the opinions of writers and readers of Oregon history who take the opposing view.
If, any time since the death of Harvey W. Scott, editor of the Oregonian for forty-five years, I had been asked to name the best informed man on Oregon history, I should unreservedly have said Mr. Holman. First, last and all the time he was a student. His mind was so constituted that it had to be fed with facts. This trait is shown with exceeding clarity in his biography of Dr. John McLoughlin, pioneer of Oregon pioneers. It is a complete work. No one doubts its accuracy. It will stand up under the test of time. Surely I cannot be wrong if I say that future generations of young students will accept the biography as authoritative. In the research work and in the labor of writing the book, Fred erick Holman builded a living monument. It will endure.
Often I wonder what impelled my friend Holman to un dertake the task. My own notion is that he was inspired by mixed motives—love, gratitude and pride. Good Dr. McLoughlin, clothed by the Hudson's Bay Company with auto cratic power in the "Oregon Country," was the staunch friend and generous benefactor of the hardy men and women who carried Anglo-Saxon civilization—American civilization—in the covered wagon two thousand miles westward into the Hudson's Bay domain. Trespassing on implicit instructions from the home office, great-hearted McLoughlin despatched food from Vancouver post to Grand Ronde Valley to sustain the regiments of "invaders." Most of them were in desperate need of it. Fred Holman's par ents were a part of the emigrant train of 1843.
I have never known a man who had a higher sense of professional and personal honor. In dealing with clients, capitalist or worker, friend or stranger, corporation or individual, he must have felt that he was bound by moral obligation to guard a solemn trust. No lawyer could be more honest, more faithful, more punctilious. He never sought clients; he waited to be sought by them. There were other struggling young lawyers who would "bend the pregnant hinges of the knee, that thrift might follow fawning," but Holman was not that kind. He would not crook a fore finger to win the most profitable law business in Portland. His pride forbade him.
He advanced rapidly in his profession by reason of high character, and ingrained studious habit. From the very start he adopted high standards. Nothing could induce him to take divorce suits, criminal defenses and other inferior cases which would increase office revenue. He specialized in law that bears upon corporations, municipalities, real estate and matters which find their way into probate courts. Before he had reached middle age, his judgment on procedure within the branches of law on which he had concentrated his intellect was quite as sound as that of able lawyers who had grown gray in practice.
Holman was born for leadership. He was under fifty years of age when contemporaneously he served as president of the Oregon Pioneer society, the Oregon Bar association and the Oregon Historical society. It is worth recording that he also had been president of the University club, the Arlington club, the Portland Rose society and the Lang Syne society. Some types of men in high positions are merely ornamental. Holman had distinct talent and the desire and the will to perform pertinent duties efficiently. He was an omnivorous reader of good literature, prose and poetry. His private library is among the finest in Portland, and he knew the contents of every volume. His collection of books bearing on Oregon history is probably the most comprehensive of any collection in the state.
Like Roosevelt, Frederick Holman worked hard and played hard. He could and did cast silk lines up trout streams as far as any companion was able to, and his bags of feathered game were equal to the other partners' in the preserve, but his chief play was roses. Before he began to cultivate the queen of flowers, he made a study of it. He wanted a solid foundation, the same as he laid for law and history. He could not depart from his studious habit, so he bought and learned by heart Dean Hole's book, the standard forty years ago, for amateur rosarians in England. He bought the best plants produced by world famed florists on Irish and French soil. Soon he grew far more beautiful blooms than had ever been dreamed of in Portland.
He did not conceal the methods by which he achieved success. On the contrary, he gave them wide-spread publicity. He taught individuals and groups all that he knew. He lectured to assemblages of men and women, and wrote instructive articles which were published by the daily press. In this way he reached practically every grower in Western Oregon, and all this purely con amore.
It happened that I lived neighbor to Holman several years, and I frequently saw him at back-breaking work in his garden. Up with the sun Sunday mornings in early spring, he would be actively engaged till dark. Any one who began with a spade to raise one bed of roses can perhaps imagine the labor Mr. Holman employed to cultivate several hundred bushes whose blooms, in early June, dazzled the beholder. Only a few of us know that he learned his first lesson in rose culture at college. He majored in chemistry. Naturally he studied the chemistry of soil. Conforming to his bent of mind, he imparted to non-students his knowledge of chemical laws as far as they related to rose culture.
Portland is now known around the globe as the Rose City. The "soubriquet" was given to her by Mr. Holman. At least two generations will remember him as the father of the Rose City. Portland is not ungrateful. His work deserves to be memorialized. He loved the rose per se, and he also inspired thousands of his fellow citizens to cultivate the flower that brought him intense joy.
In everyone's heart there is implanted a love for his birthplace. It does not grow cold. It can never die. Frederick Holman first saw the light of day seventy-five years ago near the Pacific Ocean within what is now the state of Washington. Then it was part of Oregon territory. Here his infancy was rocked. Boyhood, youth, and manhood were lived in Portland. It was my good fortune to make Fred's acquaintance soon after I came to Portland, forty-nine years ago. Lasting friendship followed. Also I learned to know other native sons in whose veins flowed the blood of brave and righteous living pioneer parents, but I believe that my friend Holman surpassed every one of them in exalted love of birthplace, and in devotion to it. As I recall contacts with him, extending over a period of nearly half a century, his bigness is more clearly revealed to me. When he confined himself to calm conversation, or spoke with strong emotion against hypocrisy, sham, demoralizing influences, deliberate deceit and public wrongs, or when he recounted with eloquent fervor the heroic deeds of pioneers, or praised the work of men who bulk large in local history, he appeared to be a worshipper of the "Oregon Country."
It was also my good fortune early to know many leading pioneers. It happened that as news correspondent I attended the second annual meeting of the Pioneer society, held at Salem. This is neither the time nor the place to write a long list of well-known names, but to illustrate a point I am trying to make, I select three giant intellects—Harvey Scott, the great editor; Judge George H. Williams and Judge Matthew P. Deady. They reflected the best spirit of their time—the old Oregon spirit—but they could not lose the love they had for their birthplace, wherever it happened to be. In Fred Holman's life the love of birthplace grew stronger and sweeter as the years passed by. In him the best spirit of the first and second generation of pioneers was embodied.
Often I wonder if all the people whose lives are led on the western slope of the "Oregon Country" appreciate the beneficence of Mother Nature. Let any mature person who has resided out here over a period of, say, fifteen years, remove to a level region—Kansas or Iowa, for instance—and he will soon discover what he misses. No matter what his vocation may be, or how his material interests are affected, his heart, if he has a heart, will yearn for the land whose feet are bathed by the water of the Pacific. Unbroken association with our evergreen mountains, majestic snow peaks, great rivers and towering forests, makes for bigness of soul. Gentle rain in winter and cloud-protected sunshine in summer contribute toward peace of mind. All of us are close neighbors to the great outdoors. No one could be more sensitive to our incomparable environment and genial climate than Holman was. Their benign influence enriched his life.
Since Oregon in 1845 became indissolubly a part of the Union, many native sons have reached distinction. Call the roll. Among the living can you point to one who is more distinguished than Frederick Holman? Fairly familiar with the record, I am not able to name a single one who now lives in this state. He lived and died a bachelor. Exceedingly kind-hearted, he did gracious acts in delicate ways for those bound to him by ties of blood or affection. His finer spiritual traits of character were known to only a small circle of intimate relatives and friends. Lacking the opportunity to lavish such love as a gentleman gives to worthy wife and children, he spent his love on his native state eagerly and constantly. To intense love he added unswerving loyalty. Among all the native sons I know, he ranks first in devotion to Oregon ideals. He despised the methods of men who extend the glad hand from ulterior motives. He hated bitterly self-exploitation in every form. True to his gentlemanly instincts, he was proud of honors that came to him for altruistic service. He had richly earned them, and carried them with due modesty. Flattery cannot "soothe the dull, cold ear of death," but it is not flattery to say that Frederick Holman's undying love of Oregon almost passeth understanding.