Save the Date for the Dedication of H Holden’s 25th and Final Monument, Frank “Pistol Pete” Eaton
Friday, September 6, 2024 at 4:00 p.m.
Corner of Duck and McElroy, Stillwater, Oklahoma
Note from editor: In 2013 RANGE magazine was given a beautiful Harold T. Holden bronze of “The Cowboy” along with a Wrangler Award. Holden’s beautiful sculpture was awarded to us in honor of our book, “Brushstrokes and Balladeers,” recognized as Best Poetry Book of the year, by the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum Oklahoma City. “H” Holden passed away in December of 2023. His biography is detailed below.
HAROLD T. HOLDEN, or “H” as he was called by most folks, was born in Enid, Oklahoma March 28, 1940, to Patrick Miles and Betty Jane Failing Holden. Although “H” was the first professional fine artist in the family, he comes from a family of creative and talented inventors and engineers. In 1915, his great-grandfather George Failing invented the bottle capping machine that is still used on beverages today. His grandfather, oil pioneer George E. Failing, invented the first portable drilling rig, as well as numerous drill bits, still used in the industry today. “H” credited his love of horses to his father who was an avid horseman and polo player. Tragically, when H was 6 years old, his father was killed in a plane crash in Enid, OK., leaving his mother Betty a widow at age 31 with three children under the age of ten. With help from the grandparents, his mother provided a stable and loving home for H, his older brother Tim and younger sister Katy. Subsequently, Betty remarried, and youngest sister Myrlane joined the family. H attended and graduated from Enid High School in 1958 and during his high school years played football and ran track, medaling in the State 880 relay. As a high school sophomore, H attended summer school at Culver Military academy in Culver, Indiana. There, he won the Lightweight boxing championship, following prior championships won in boxing by his older Brother Tim.
After graduating from Enid High School, “H” attended Oklahoma State University but a trip to Houston to work on an oil rig in 1959 resulted in a chance meeting with an instructor at the Texas Academy of Art, from which H graduated with an art degree in 1962. He then began his art career in the commercial art field, working in Wichita, Kansas and in Houston, Texas, where he eventually took the position of art director at Horseman Magazine. While working during the day for other folks, “H” began his fine art career at night, painting and sculpting his first love, the West. He was completely self-taught as a sculptor.
“H” had an interest in horses his entire life. He and his cousin Jeff Holden spent several years raising and running quarter horses both in Oklahoma and other states. He continued to have ranch horses for both pleasure and for team roping throughout his life.
After a tour of duty with the Navy during Vietnam aboard the U. S. S. Rainier, “H” ventured out on his own in 1973, to try and make it as a professional fine artist. Commissions from the National Cattlemen’s Association from 1982-1986 helped and collectors began taking notice of his work.
He was known for his attention to detail, and particularly his sculptures of horses. Believing that an artist should know his subject matter, he spent much of his leisure time team roping and staying close to the cowboy way of life.
In 1987 “H” was chosen to sculpt a series of commemorative bronzes to depict the 165-year history of the Cherokee Strip in Oklahoma and Kansas. That same year he completed his first of many monuments, “Boomer” for the City of Enid, Oklahoma. The image of Boomer went on to be used on a U. S. Postage Stamp and the symbol of the Cherokee Strip in both Kansas and Oklahoma. Since that first monument 36 years ago H completed 24 additional monuments for placement in Oklahoma, Texas, Kansas and Arkansas, among them, “Oklahoma’s Native Son” at Will Rogers World Airport, “We Will Remember” at Oklahoma State University, “Headin’ to Market” at the OKC Stockyards, which H dedicated to his first grandson Patrick Martin Meyer who died at the age of 4 ½ days, “World Champion” at the OKC Fairgrounds, “Monarch at Rest” at the Oklahoma History Center and “Cherokee Kid” at Rogers State University. He also completed several monuments for universities to assist in their Endowments through the sale of maquettes including the Northwestern Oklahoma State University “Ranger” in Enid and Alva, the “Broncho” at the University of Central Oklahoma, “Crossing the Red” for the Altus Public School Foundation and “Vision Seeker” for the Altus and Enid Public School Foundations, along with the “Bison Spirit” for Oklahoma Baptist University. His “U. S. Deputy Marshal Bass Reeves” monument in Ft. Smith was the first equestrian sculpture to be dedicated in Arkansas and his larger-than-life monument of “E. K. Gaylord” stands in the hall of the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum in OKC.
In 2007 “H” was diagnosed with a fatal lung disease “Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis” for which there is no known cause or cure. After suffering failing health, in 2009, he closed his studio and got his affairs in order. Wade Burleson, his minister and his church family at Emmanuel Baptist Church in Enid continued to pray for H’s healing and those prayers were answered when in July 2010 he received a lifesaving single lung transplant at the Nazih Zuhdi Transplant Center at Integris Medical Center in Oklahoma City. At that time H was the oldest recipient of a lung transplant at the facility. In gratitude for his second chance at life, a casting of his six-foot monument “Thank You Lord,” graces the garden at Emmanuel Baptist Church in Enid and a second casting stands outside the Emergency Room of the Nazih Zuhdi Transplant Center in Oklahoma City. At the time of his death on December 6, 2023, H was working on a larger-than-life sculpture of a childhood hero, Frank “Pistol Pete” Eaton for the campus of OSU. That piece was completed by his friends John Rule and Paul Moore and will be dedicated on September 6, 2024, at 4:00 p.m. on the campus at Oklahoma State University.
Other accolades are as follows:
- Received the Lifetime Achievement award from the Oklahoma Sculpture Society in 2000
- Inducted into the Mountain Oyster Club as a lifetime member in 2000.
- Awarded the Governor’s Art Award from Oklahoma Governor Frank Keating in 2001
- Elected to Professional Membership in the National Sculpture Society in 2004
- Honored with a Distinguished Alumni Award from Oklahoma State University in 2005
- Invited into membership in the prestigious Cowboy Artists of America organization in 2013, now Emeritus.
- Won the James Earle Fraser sculpture award at the 2020 Prix de West art show at the National Cowboy Museum for excellence in sculpture.
- Inducted into the Oklahoma Hall of Fame, in 2014, the highest honor the state can bestow on one of its citizens.
- The first Oklahoma artist to be inducted into the Hall of Great Westerners at the National Cowboy Museum in Oklahoma City, in recognition of his lifelong pursuit of capturing the West through his art in 2017. Received the Wrangler Award, which is a bronze he sculpted.
- Received the Ray Swanson Memorial Award at the 2019 Cowboy Artists of America show in Ft. Worth Texas
- Inducted into the Oklahoma State University Hall of Fame on February 2, 2024
2023 was a big year with H celebrating his 83rd year of life, his 13th year with a new lung and 50 years as a Professional Fine Artist. He completed a life and one-half size figure of major donor “T. Boone Pickens” for Oklahoma State University in Stillwater OK and a life and one-half size sculpture of “Barry Sanders,” also for Oklahoma State University as well as a three-quarter size Buffalo called “Buffalo Run” for the Town of Waukomis. H created twenty-five different monuments throughout his fifty plus year career.
H and his wife Edna Mae, who is a fourth generation Oklahoman, were married for nearly 35 years. Edna Mae still lives in their home near Kremlin, Oklahoma with a few horses, a longhorn and some rowdy dogs.
