June 16, 1950 -

March 6, 2022

Terry Holo was the coolest big brother in the world. With movie-star looks and that silver tongue, he could have gotten by on style alone, but he was a man of substance who defined himself not by his own achievements, but by helping his friends and loved ones succeed.

As a young man in need of adventure, he drove the Alaska-Canada highway up from Montana to Fairbanks. After a conversation with a restaurant owner whose business was slow, Terry created what was likely one of the first entertainment subscription clubs. Within two years he was employing half a dozen old friends and helping small businesses across the Western US. In his life, he started three businesses from scratch, all dedicated to helping small "main-street" businesses, and all of them employing friends and family members. Terry was like that mountain-climber who scales the face of the cliff, ties off the rope, and then throws it back down so that others can rise.

This is not to say he was all about business. To give you some flavor of his adventurous young life, one weekend night in Livingston Montana, Terry and his friend Dan Sebena happened across the set of two of his film heroes, Jeff Bridges and Harry Dean Stanton making a movie called Rancho Deluxe. They took a quick look around, slipped under the rope, and made their way to the center of the action. Both Joe and Terry looked like "central casting" for Montana boys out on the town, so of course the cameras swung their way. In the bar scene, while Jimmy Buffett is belting out "Livingston Saturday Night", that handsome young man dancing with the Budweiser in his hand is Terry having the time of his life.

It would be impossible to overstate the dedication and loyalty Terry demonstrated to his family. He helped raise my sister Mary and I, and what I remember most was that he made time to play with us in the most incredible ways. He'd create new and unique games, complete with props and rules and backstories. He got such a kick out of watching us think and create. Although Terry never had children of his own, he played a big role in raising three sets of children in our family. Mary and Bob, Aaron and Jessie, Ty and Savannah all loved and looked up to this wonderful man and traveled to be with him in his final days. In fact, the last words he said to me were: "...Never had children but I helped raise six of them. It seems like all I ever did was raise kids. I did a pretty good job of it, didn't I?"

Finally, in what was undoubtedly his most difficult challenge in life, Terry moved in with, and cared for our father in his final battle with dementia. Terry and Dad had a rough start and it was something he had wanted to repair: In the 1970's, Terry was "hell on wheels" as a young man, and Dad was already stretched to his limits trying to run the Thompson Falls school system while funding and building a new school facility. They butted heads and parted on strained terms. As Terry was a fiercely independent and headstrong young man, he learned many of his early life lessons alone and the hard way. Ironically, it was very similar to Dad's young life, and in the end, they came to understand how truly alike they were. Brilliant idealism tempered by hard-knocks made both Dad and Terry value family and community over anything else. In the end, as Dad faced the horror of losing his life's memories, Terry was his patient and understanding advocate and friend. In the words of our eldest brother Dave: "Terry faced all his fears head-on doing that. It is a debt that we, as a family, can never repay."

It's an impossible task to capture the life of Terry Holo in a few paragraphs. Please accept these few snippets as testament to the number of people whose lives he made better, and know that of all the places that he traveled, he felt most at home in Thompson Falls. Its why he returned here at the end. Family & friends - he loved you all.