Holmes, Madeline (1904-1999). Papers, 1924-1993.

Madeline A. Holmes was born on May 22, 1904, at Grand Rapids, Michigan, to Dr. and Mrs. John G. Huizinga. She was graduated from South High School in Grand Rapids in 1920 and earned a B.A. degree from Maryville College, Tennessee, in 1924. She earned an M.A. degree from the University of Michigan in 1928. In 1935 she studied at the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University, Chicago, Illinois, and again at the University of Michigan from 1945 1948.

She taught Spanish, English and journalism at Ottawa High School in Grand Rapids. She also played the cello and piano and was a Sunday School and Adult Bible Class teacher.

In 1952, she was appointed a short term missionary to Arabia and became a career missionary to that field in 1955. In 1957, she took over the House of Happiness Orphanage in Kuwait and Bahrain. She ended her missionary service and 1968 and retired in Zeeland, Michigan.

She died on January 22, 1999, in Holland, Michigan, at the age of ninety four.

A quote from a letter in 1972 may suggest her personal philosophy and personality. “...we were advised to keep a Log of Joy, but how could I keep one when my life is so full of joyful experiences that, quoting St. John, ‘If they should be written everyone, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that should be written.’”