Holt, Henry (1840-1926)

American publisher who encouraged the publication of books on psychic phenomena. Holt was born on January 3, 1840, in Baltimore, Maryland. He attended Yale University (B.S., 1862) and the Columbia University Law School (LL.B., 1864). In 1866 Holt became a partner in the publishing company of George P. Putnam, and later founded Henry Holt and Company. He also became a council member of the American Society for Psychical Research.

Holt's interest in psychic phenomena led him to promote research and to publish books on the subject, including his own work On the Cosmic Relations (2 vols., 1914). A revised edition was issued after World War I with additional matter on immortality, under the title The Cosmic Relations and Immortality (1918). He died February 13, 1926.

The company continued in existence, and in 1941 published the important one-volume edition of The Books of Charles Fort, dealing with bizarre, inexplicable, and mysterious phenomena.

(See also Charles Fort )

Sources:

Holt, Henry. Calmire. New York: Macmillan, 1892.

——. Garrulities of an Octogenarian Editor. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1923.

——. Man and Man. N.p., 1905.

——. Man and Nature. N.p., 1892.

——. On the Cosmic Relations. 1914. Rev. ed. as The Cosmic Relations and Immortality. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1919.

Holt, Henry

Holt, Henry, Austrian-born American conductor and opera administrator; b. Vienna, April 11, 1934; Charlottesville, Va., Oct. 4, 1997. He studied with Strelitzer at Los Angeles City Coll. and with Dahl at the Univ. of Southern Calif, in Los Angeles. In 1961 he made his conducting debut with Rigoletto with the American Opera Co. in Los Angeles. He was general director of the Portland (Ore.) Opera from 1964 to 1966. From 1966 to 1984 he was general director of the Seattle Opera, where he conducted its acclaimed Wagner Festivals.

—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire