Hollis Name Study

Profile managers: One Name Studies WikiTree [send private message] and B. Hollis [send private message]

How to Join

Please contact the project leader B. Hollis or post a comment at the foot of the page. If you have any questions, just ask. Thanks!

Goals

This is a One Name Study to collect together in one place everything about the surname Hollis and its variants. The hope is that other researchers like you will join our study to help make it a valuable reference point for people studying lines that cross or intersect.

Task List

Thomas Hollis (1720-1774) -Harvard University Connection: Is Thomas Hollis one of your ancestors?

Thomas Hollis was born in 1659, the eldest son of Thomas Hollis and his wife nee Mary Whiting. The family were Baptists, living in the dissenting enclave of the Minories in London, running a cutlery and hardware business established by his grandfather John Ramsker, a Sheffield cutler.

In 1683 Thomas Hollis married Hannah Legay, daughter of Isaac Legay and his wife nee Katherine Williams. She died in 1724 (1). They had no children.

He adopted a son of his brother Nathaniel, "but not content to do thus much, very imperiously forced him into the trade - Mr. John Hollis objected to the young man, as an obstinate and awkward person, more likely to be troublesome than of any use ; which, indeed, proved to be the case." (2).

Despite family problems, the business prospered. Having become wealthy through its success, the interests of Thomas Hollis lay in wholesale charity rather than wholesale cutlery. Like their father Thomas Hollis 1634-1718 both brothers were benefactors of the Hollis Hospital in Sheffield, and governors of St Thomas’s Hospital in London. Like him, both made donations to Harvard College, the foremost place of learning in the American colonies.

The attention of Thomas Hollis had been drawn to Harvard by an uncle, who was himself a benefactor. "I have had many thoughts of showing some liberality to it ever since the death of my honoured uncle, Robert Thorner, who made me one of his trustees." (3).

However the benefaction by Thomas Hollis was to be on a far greater scale. In 1721 Thomas Hollis informed his American correspondent that "his success in business inclined his heart 'to a proportional distribution'". His first funds sent over were for "the maintenance and education of pious young men for the ministry, who are poor in this world". But he was persuaded by the college dignitaries to set up instead a Professorship of Divinity "notwithstanding the great difference of his theological opinions". Negotiations took two years, and "Hollis could never have fully appreciated the fact that the first candidate who was proposed for the professorship - assented to the divine right of infant baptism", which was the opposite of Baptist doctrine (4).

Meanwhile he was continually sending over books for the college library, and had a printed catalogue distributed to encourage further donation. Then in 1726 he sent funds for setting up a Professorship in Mathematics, followed in the next year by costly scientific apparatus. Altogether his gifts exceeded £6,000. He resisted all pressure to spread his American benefaction. "I have no inclination to be diverted from my projected design," he wrote "I was disgusted at the suggestion and refused to read on." "Yale College led me to suspect a snake in the grass".

Yet for all his obstinacy, he was a modest man. "My donations to the College", he wrote "having made more discourse about it than formerly in London, I could have wisht to have been less well knowne, only quiet my mind, in that possibly some others may be moved to like good worke for your advantage" (5).

Thomas Hollis died on 24 January 1731.

In his Will dated 6 January 1730 (6) Thomas Hollis left £2000 to his brother John Hollis, and confirmed the settlement already made for benefit of his children Isaac Hollis, Timothy Hollis, Mary Winnock, Hannah Edwards, and Elizabeth Ashurst. To his brother Nathaniel Hollis he bequeathed £1000 and £200 per annum.

Other beneficiaries included his great-nephew John Solly (property in east Kent); nephew William Ladds £1000; niece Mary Reynolds (wife of John Reynolds) £1000; her daughter Mary Reynolds £1000, furniture and portrait of her mother; Elizabeth Williams (wife of John Williams and daughter of his late uncle John Hollis of St Albans) £100; £100 each to her children; £100 each to Hannah Malyn and Elizabeth Malyn, children of his late cousin Dorothy Malyn; Joshua Hollis, covenant servant to himself and brother John £300; Elizabeth Hollis and Ann Hollis (children of his late cousin Thomas Hollis of St Albans cutler) £300 by the hands of their brother Joshua Hollis; an income from his Orphan’s Stock in the Chamber of London for his cousin Hannah Hutton senior for life and then for her children; his cousin Hannah Hutton (wife of James Hutton senior) £200; her son George Hutton £100; Elizabeth Edmonds (daughter of his cousin Hannah Hutton) £50; £2500 to trustees John Hollis and sons in trust for purposes directed; Christ Church Hospital in London and St Thomas’s Hospital £500 each for apprenticing poor boys; the New Workhouse in Bishopsgate Street £500; the French Church in Threadneedle Steet and the Dutch Church in Austin Friars £100 each for their poor; Trinity Minories church £20 for poor housekeepers in the parish and £30 more; £100 in trust for poor labouring workmen in Sheffield; £50 in trust for poor labouring workmen in Birmingham and the same for those in Wolverhampton; the Society for the Reformation of Manners in London £100; Jeremiah Hunt £100; and his son Benjamin Hunt £100.

His nephew Thomas Hollis (son of his brother Nathaniel Hollis) was to be his successor as trustee under the Will of Robert Thorner, and his nephew was also to have his powers in nominating professors and students on his foundation at Harvard College and appointing his successor. He was also to have his house in London, lands in Pollox Hill at Bedford, £3000 (in trust to his father until he became 21), and all the residue of his personal estate. He was also appointed his sole executor. In a Codicil dated 6 July 1730, £50 was bequeathed to Josiah Maber and £50 each to servants. Two days after Thomas Hollis died, probate of his Will was granted to his sole executor, his nephew Thomas, on 26 January 1731.

(1) Some Memorials of the Hollis Family G. Hester (1895) pages 14 and 15. (2) Memoirs of Thomas Brand-Hollis, Esq. J. Disney (1808) page 46; Some Memorials of the Hollis Family G. Hester (1895) page 15. (3) The Harvard Graduates' Magazine W.R. Thayer et al. volume 3 (1894-95) page 342. The trusteeship was set up by Robert Thorner in his Will dated 31 May 1690. (4) The Harvard Graduates' Magazine W.R. Thayer et al. volume 3 (1894-95) pages 342 and 343. (5) The Harvard Graduates' Magazine W.R. Thayer et al. volume 3 (1894-95) pages 344 to 347. (6) An abstract of the Will is given in The New England Historical and Genealogical Register : Genealogical Gleanings in England H F Waters volume 45 (1891) pages 56 to 57. http://hollisclassic.harvard.edu/ Featured Item: Thomas Hollis Letters Lists of books donated to the Harvard College Library by Thomas Hollis, 1763-1787.

The oldest endowed professorship 1721 gift led to long line of Hollis Chair occupants at Divinity School By Colleen Walsh, Harvard Staff Writer Little could a wealthy London merchant know that his gift to Harvard in 1721 would transform how students are taught in today’s universities, and lead to a fundamental shift in the School’s founding ethos. The seeds of change took root with creation of the Hollis Professorship of Divinity, the oldest endowed professorship in North America, enabled by Thomas Hollis, a philanthropist with a passion for liberty and religious expression. Though he never visited New England, Hollis was familiar with Harvard by way of his uncle Robert Thorner, who had left the sum of 500 pounds to the College in his will. Hollis was interested in, he wrote, “the liberties the Baptists in New England enjoyed.” “Hollis had come to believe that Harvard was an academic institution that would be broad-minded toward all sects, and he was interested in encouraging the liberal spirit that was gaining strength in Boston and Cambridge,” wrote William Bentinck-Smith and Elizabeth Stouffer in “Harvard University History of Named Chairs” (1995). The Londoner understood religious intolerance, since his Baptist faith put him at odds with the Church of England. Worried about the perceived intolerance of New England’s Congregationalists, Hollis stipulated several conditions for the new professorship, aimed at preventing religious bias. In the rules laid out by Hollis, the holder of the chair would have to “be a Masters of Arts, and in Communion with some Christian Church of one of the three Denominations, Congregational Presbiterian or Baptist.” Hollis’ philanthropy ran deep. Prior to creating the chair, which he endowed at 80 pounds a year, he sent casks of nails and cutlery along with scientific instruments to the College and regularly contributed books that reflected liberal thinking. In 1727, he established the Hollis Professorship of Mathematicks and Natural Philosophy. Some observers say his generosity even outmatched that of Harvard’s most famous benefactor, namesake John Harvard. While remaining true to their Calvinist trainings, early holders of the professorship gradually began to move toward a more liberal ideology. During his 43-year tenure as the first appointee, Edward Wigglesworth offered “antithetical views on a theological subject, forcing the student to think and draw his own conclusions,” wrote Russell V. Kohr in a 1981 master’s thesis for Western Michigan University. Edward Wigglesworth II, who took over for his father in 1765, was an authority on both theology and mathematics and an original member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. “The establishment of the chair really marked a critical step toward more ecumenical training,” said Harvey Cox, Hollis Research Professor of Divinity who held the Hollis professorship for several years until 2009. But trouble erupted in 1805 when Henry Ware, a Unitarian minister and the valedictorian of Harvard’s class of 1785, was elected to the position. The decision sent shockwaves through the Harvard campus. The move broke with the tradition of appointing an orthodox Calvinist to the post in favor of a more liberal Unitarian. So angered were some conservatives, led by acting president Eliphalet Pearson, that they decamped for nearby Andover, where in 1807 they founded the Andover Theological Seminary, the nation’s first formal school devoted to the education of ministers. But in addition to stirring controversy, Hollis’ gifts prompted an understanding of the need for professors who were authorities in their fields, as opposed to tutors who would instruct students in a variety of topics. The shift set the stage for creating more endowed professorships and gradually restructuring instruction at Harvard and beyond. “The establishment of the chair broke the lockstep of the practice inherited by Harvard College from Oxford and Cambridge Universities, by which a tutor taught all members of a class all subjects,” said Kohr in his essay. “Henceforth, the divinity professor taught only divinity, and thus the vertical, or departmental, system of curricular organization was begun at the College.” The Hollis Chair, as legend suggests, also came with one important right, resurrected by Cox: the right to graze a cow in Harvard Yard. As one of his parting acts before stepping down from the chair, Cox borrowed a bovine from the Farm School in Athol. The animal’s presence, Cox told a crowd near the steps of Memorial Church in 2009, represented “how much closer we need to be to the animals that sustain us, to the Earth, the grass, the vegetables.” The current holder of the professorship is Karen King, whose research centers on women and heresy in ancient Christianity. The first woman to hold the post, she called her selection extraordinary. “Appointing me to this chair connects the history of women at the University back to a time when women weren’t present,” said King, a member of the faculty at Harvard Divinity School.  “I think my appointment shows us, too, a lot about how far the University has come, and the direction Harvard has taken from a narrow piety of male clergy to the embrace of women and many religious traditions.”

Comment from Harvard University Archives Thomas Hollis, library benefactor and namesake of the Harvard Online Library catalog Thomas Hollis (1720-1774) and his family helped build Harvard's library collections, both before and after the catastrophic fire of 1764. In honor of the debut of the Harvard Library's HOLLIS+ discovery system this month, the Archives presents a selection of notes and letters written by Thomas Hollis and indicative of his generous nature. The welcome extended by Harvard to its 18th-century benefactor will surely be echoed by 21st-century users of the eponymous catalog. More information about Thomas Hollis can be found in the Archives' finding aid for the Lists of books donated to the Harvard College Library by Thomas Hollis, 1763-1787.