Meeting Thelma Holdaway

Thelma Myrl Holdaway was born on July 25, 1904, in Vernal, Utah, to Thomas Teancum Holdaway and Mary Eliza White Holdaway. She was the 9th of 10 children born to this couple: Harold ("Harl"), Leon and Bruce (both died young), Florence ("Floss"), Owney (died young), Mark, Hattie (died age 9), Marie, Thelma and Ken.

In Mark Merrill's recordings of "Pearls from the Past", Thelma said the following.

My Birthday is July 25 and I know I was born on a Monday, because Mark [Holdaway] sent me a birthday card a couple of years ago and it said, "You were born on Monday, because the 24th of July was on Sunday and we didn’t celebrate it.  We celebrated it on the 25th.  And after we had been to the parade we came back and there was our little sister named Thelma." Monday’s child is full of grace, isn’t it? Well...I'll accept that.

Thelma wrote on 8 August 1989, in the beginning of her life story:

I was born in Vernal Utah in 1904. I don't remember the town or my first years there, as we moved to Provo when I was 4 years old. I do have some memories of that trip. We traveled in a covered wagon--not a big Conestoga wagon like the Pioneers had--but a good sized wagon, drawn by 4 horses. We took 8 days to make the trip, camping at night. My father chose the camp sites so the horses would have grass and water. I have memories of the camp fires and the food that we had. Marie (my sister) said that whenever she ate canned tomatoes or canned corn she recalled those camp fires. Nowadays one can make the trip from Vernal to Provo in three or fewer hours.

The house I remember living in was a white house made of adobe. There was a lovely lawn in front and I remember mother sitting there reading to us kids—me, Marie and Ken. I remember a book that she read to us, "Five Little Peppers and How They Grew" by Margaret Sidney.  I have a copy of that book. It is dedicated, "To the memory of my mother: wise in counsel, tender in judgement and in all charity, strong in Christian faith and purpose, I dedicate, with reverence, this simple book."

That could be how my mother was. Marie has written her life for me and Ken because we didn't remember her. She died when I was six and Ken was four. 

Thelma, Ken and Marie Holdaway, 1907.
Three youngest children of Thomas Teancum & Mary Eliza White Holdaway.

Here is Thelma at age 3 (above), and age 5 (below).

Thelma, Hap, Kenneth and Buelah Holdaway, about 1909.
Thelma Holdaway (b. 1904, left), Harold Elmer "Hap" Holdaway (b. 1908, back), Kenneth Holdaway (b. 1906, front), La Rue (Buelah) Holdaway (b. 1906, right).  Thelma & Kenneth children of Thomas Teancum Holdaway & Mary Eliza White.  Hap & Beulah children of Henry Harold "Harl" Holdaway & Maria Oldham Remington.

Malcolm and Thelma's First Date

Thelma attended the Utah Agricultural College (UAC, now Utah State University) in Logan, Utah.

Thelma Holdaway

Malcolm said that it was in his fourth year of college that Thelma appeared on the scene:

Well, she came and worked in the library, and I spent quite a lot of time in the library. I studied pretty hard. And I kept seeing this black-eyed gal with a Dutch cut, you know, and it wasn’t very long before we began dating, and we’d meet in the hall. I was editor of the newspaper, so I was always hanging around in the hall collecting news, and she was always having to dash through the hall to get to the library, and so it just happened one way or another that we’d meet several times a day. 

Thelma Holdaway (left) and two of her friends.

I remember Malcolm telling that one day he was in a building on campus and he looked over and saw Thelma talking to her friends. She did "some cute thing" that got his attention and then he took her on a date.

Malcolm Merrill, Thelma Holdaway

Thelma told about their first date (from Robert's recording of Malcolm. Click the triangle to listen):

Oh, our first date, Malcolm asked me to go to the Pantages—that’s like a Vaudeville sort of thing. I told my roommates that Malcolm Merrill asked me for a date, and I didn’t know how to say no, so I said yes. So we went, and we had a great time. We had lots of fun! And we walked along after the show was over. We walked along and looked in the windows and picked out our furniture—just hooping and hollering, thinking it was the silliest thing that we either one of us did. 

They had such fun that they continued dating.

I love these pictures of them when they were young together.

Malcolm "beating" Thelma.
(Especially funny because Malcolm was one of the kindest, gentlest people you would ever meet)

And one of my personal favorites...

Thelma and her snooty hat.

Thelma said, "We dated for about a year, just going to things once in a while." She had a "heart-break" at one point when he took another girl to a banquet (because he had invited her a year ahead of time). Then she said, 

So, I went to hear him give his valedictory speech at college anyway, and sat by his father and mother. And that’s when his father said he fell in love with me. So, after that, of course I had it made, because Edgar and Clara—they were on my side.

Clara Hendricks Merrill and Thelma Holdaway (Merrill)

After he graduated, Malcolm attended medical school for a year before they got married. We have a box full of love letters that Malcolm and Thelma wrote to each other while he was away.

"Ever devotedly thine. --Malcolm"
(And he was!)

This is my favorite picture of young Thelma.

Thelma Holdaway (Merrill)

Thelma said, "Poor old Malcolm went far away, out in the world, to go medical school. And his mother thought that was sad for him to be out there in the world all alone. (Any place out of Utah is “out in the world.”) So she was pulling for us to get married. So…we did!"

Malcolm said,

Then I went away in early September [1925] to St. Louis, Missouri to school, doing graduate work first in bacteriology that first year. Then I came back the next summer. We had it all worked out before the winter was over that we’d get married the next summer. So I came back the next summer and we got married on August 11, 1926. Then we got on a Pullman [i.e., a sleeper train car], two of us in a lower birth (heh! heh!) and went to St. Louis.

They were married in the Logan Temple (where Malcolm's grandfather, Marriner Wood Merrill, had been the first temple president), when Thelma was 22 and Malcolm was 23.

And they lived happily ever after! I remember as a child being impressed that after all those years, they would still go on walks together, holding hands. What a great example they were of love, kindness and devotion.

In the next episode, we welcome Don and Bruce to the family!

Malcolm Merrill, Thelma Holdaway