- Anthony Mervin Holt, 83, of the Redwoods Hotel, died Thursday (Feb. 28, 1967) at Josephine General Hospital. Born June 29, 1883, in Ontario, Canada, he had lived here since 1952.
Private graveside services will be Thursday at Hawthorne Memorial Gardens, with Hull and Hull Funeral Home in charge.
Survivors include the widow, Margaret, Grants Pass; a daughter Daryle, Rogue River; a son, John, Grants Pass; a brother, Fred, Ontario, Canada, and two grandsons. [Tony also had a stepdaughter, Mary Lou DeJanvier.]
Anthony "Tony" M. Holt was born June 29, 1883 in Wallace Township, Perth County, Ontario. [Familysearch.org lists that Tony was born in Moorefield, Wellington County, Ontario.] He was the son of John Holt and Charlotte Anger. Both of Tony's parents were born in Canada, although the Holt line originally came from Ireland around 1842. Charlotte Victoria, born in 1879, was the first child born to John Holt and his wife Charlotte. Next came William John, born in 1881. Two years later, in 1883, Anthony Mervyn came along, followed lastly by Frederick George in 1885. Tony's siblings all stayed in Canada.
On Tony's obituary and death certificate, his middle name is listed as Mervin, but according to his WWI registration card, his middle name is written as Mervyn (His middle name has also been written as Melvin-see birth documentation.). All men in the United States had to fill out this registration card, whether or not they eventually enlisted. This card lists his occupation as "Druggist", something he must have worked at his whole life, as his death certificate lists his occupation as "proprietor, pharmacist retail drug store". Tony's WWI registration card from the County of Sheridan, Montana, lists him as age 35 and married. His wife was Agnes Gertrude Dailey, who he had married on Jan. 18, 1909 in Devils Lake, Ramsey County, North Dakota. One son, John ("Jack") M., was born on Nov. 10, 1909, and one daughter, Daryle Carmille, born Apr. 13, 1912, came from this marriage. Both children were born in North Dakota, but the family eventually moved to Saskatchewan, as they show up living in Saskatchewan on the Canadian 1916 Census (Mervin, Agnes, John and Daryl). They next appear to have moved to Montana where they show up on the 1920 US Census living in Sheridan. Tony and Agnes later divorced. It is not yet known where Agnes is buried.
Tony must have been in the military, because he had a gray wool blanket from that time, that had one black stripe on it. It isn't yet known if he was with the United States or the Canadian forces. The black stripe showed that he must have been an officer. In the US Army, officers had a black stripe running up their pant leg. This originated from the time when most officers were on horse back, and riding a horse would cause a kind of a stripe on their pants.
His second wife was Margaret Janet Hood, the widow of William C. McCauley. Tony had first met Margaret years before when he roomed at her parent's boarding house in Devils Lake, North Dakota. Tony eventually moved back up to Canada to take over his parent's farm. He and Margaret were married on October 12, 1950 in Listowel, Ontario, and they lived on the farm for about one year. After that, the couple relocated to Grants Pass Oregon, where they lived on 7th Street. Tony's son was living in Grants Pass, and his daughter lived in the southern Oregon area where she worked as a dance teacher. Margaret's daughter was working in southern California. Tony was known in the family for his Irish stew (which he tried to make once a year or so) and his love of dogs. Tony's son had a dog named George who was very devoted to Tony. Often Jack would drop off George on his way to work, so that George could spend the day with Tony. As George got older, he would sometimes take off on his own, trying to find his way to Tony's house. One rainy night, George lost his way and got hit by a car in downtown Grants Pass.
While living in Grants Pass, Tony always kept a large vegetable garden in the back yard. They had many flowering plants also. Bleeding hearts grew on the side of the house, and in the back there was a yellow flowering forsythia bush, and a large snowball tree.
Tony also was a big story teller. It isn't known how much fact versus fiction were in the stories. He told his step granddaughter Janet that when he was a young boy he swallowed a rock, so worried that he would turn into a rock. He also told the tale of being a young child and getting a doll for Christmas. He was so upset that he got a doll, that he broke the doll before the day ended. He also taught Janet, as a baby, how to stick out her tongue, and tried to teach her to whistle, but she never was very good at it. They had a canary for a while, that Tony would whistle to, showing once again, how much he liked to be around animals.
Around the time that Tony's wife Margaret was placed in a nursing home, Tony moved to the Redwood's Hotel on 6th Street in downtown Grants Pass. This was a hotel that, at that time, had a lot of elderly people living there, and there was a restaurant on the first floor where the occupants, or anyone in town, could eat. Tony died on Feb. 28, 1967, and is buried at Hawthorne Memborial Gardens in Grants Pass. His daughter is buried next to him.
A privately published book on the Holt line had this to say about Tony:
"Anthony Melvin Holt was born June 29, 1883 in Wallace Township, and grew up there. On January 18, 1909 he married Agnes Gertrude Dailey at Devils Lake, N.D. She was born May 5, 1890. They had two children and were divorced. Anthony came back to Wallace Twp and took over his father's farm in 1938, until he sold it in 1951. He returned to the U.S.A. and married Margaret Janet McCauley and they lived at Grants Pass, Oregon."
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1883 - 1967 (83 years)
