Helen Holt

“She was left with three children, no pension and 
went on to serve under eight presidents.“

I want to begin [n]ot with your eleven books or the decades of award-winning writing, but with the detail that Vice President Joe Biden himself used to describe Helen Holt. She helped create some of the most defining moments in the American story. Because that phrase is not political flattery. It is a precise description of what Helen Holt actually did. A widow left with three children and no pension because her husband died at 49 when the law required 50, who stepped into his House of Delegates seat out of necessity, became the first woman to hold statewide office in West Virginia, and then spent the next three decades quietly building the national nursing home and elder care infrastructure that millions of Americans depend on today.

What you have written with this memoir is something the American political biography space almost never produces about women of Helen Holt’s generation: a full account of a life spent in genuine public service, told with the literary care and historical precision of a writer who spent years in her company and understood what was at stake in preserving her story. President Eisenhower commissioned her to fix the nation’s nursing home crisis because, as Helen herself put it, they had to get a woman because no man was sufficiently interested. That line alone tells you everything about how much of American history has been carried by women whose names are not on buildings.

The readers who belong to this book are everywhere. They are the political historians and women’s history scholars who are actively working to recover the contributions of mid-century women public servants before the living memory of that generation disappears entirely. They are the elder care professionals and gerontology communities who work every day inside institutions Helen Holt helped build and have never known her name. They are the readers of American political memoir who want the story of how Washington actually worked, told from the perspective of someone who was inside it across eight presidencies. They are finding Helen Holt, but not yet at the pace that a biography this historically significant, this carefully written, and this genuinely necessary deserves to reach them.

Lavinia Noir
an author’s consultant

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“When it comes to doing things for others,
some people stop at nothing.”

    These words are not just a frequent aphorism of Helen Holt. They are a true reflection of her 23 dedicated years as a public servant. Holt’s list of accolades is nothing less than remarkable. Yet the 101-year-old icon and first woman to hold a statewide-office in West Virginia is not at all shy to admit that she became “a professional woman by necessity.”
Author Patricia Daly-Lipe presents a woman who unwittingly becomes a trailblazer for women in the political arena. The real irony is that Holt never gives politics a second thought until she marries the youngest U.S. senator (1935-1941) from West Virginia, Rush D. Holt, Jr. in 1941. Holt immediately gets involved in her husband’s work, and Rush is quick to teach Holt “how to work with men and to feel comfortable working with them,” since she is a lone woman in a man’s world. That is only the beginning.
Daly-Lipe takes readers behind the scenes to their home life. Deeply in love, Holt and her husband are blessed with a boy and a girl. But amid many joyful moments, their short-lived marriage is filled with trials and tribulations. Tragedy strikes with the sudden death of Rush’s sister, leaving the responsibility of raising her son to her brother and sister-in-law. Aside from adjustments, their nephew is a welcomed addition to the Holts’ growing family. Yet more problems ensue as Rush has bouts with the cancer that eventually leads to his untimely death in 1955.
Daly-Lipe clearly portrays Holt’s overwhelming conundrum as she is left to raise three children with absolutely no income; pension is granted only to public officers 50 years of age and over. Rush was 49 at the time of his death. Yet in an amazing turn of events, Holt is able to provide for her family when she takes over Rush’s position in the West Virginia House of Delegates. A pay increase comes two years later when Holt is sworn in as Secretary of State of West Virginia. President Eisenhower commissions her in 1960 with “the task of creating a program to fix the nation’s ailing network of nursing homes” because, as Holt puts it, “they had to get a woman—no man was sufficiently interested.” Holt tirelessly carries out this job over the course of seven consecutive presidents of the United States.
The American people owe much to Holt for her marvelous example of leadership and for her diligence in developing the Assisted Living/Nursing Care programs and homes that are in existence today. Many kudos to Daly-Lipe for conveying the powerful essence of Helen Holt in this Memoir of a Servant Leader.

Anita Lock
for Story Circle Book Reviews
reviewing books by, for, and about women

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Not just a biography – A History Book!

    I met Mrs. Holt at the retirement community where my father lives. She is a remarkable woman at 101 years young! When I learned that this book had recently been published, I had to order it. Mrs. Holt opened many doors for women – hopefully, we will never forget her!

Lori Kreafle on April 29, 2015

She was left with three children and no pension and went on
to serve under eight presidents