This Week in Texas Methodist History October 15

Nannie Holding Enters Laredo Seminary October 20, 1883

On October 20, 1883 Nannie Holding of Covington, Kentucky, entered Laredo Seminary to begin twenty years of missinary service. Her accomplishments were so significant that the name of the school was changed to Holding Institute. Laredo Seminary had been founded on acreage overlooking the Rio Grande near Laredo in 1880 by the Reverends A. H. Sutherland and Joseph Norwood. It provided educational and religious services to Spanish speaking children and youth living on both sides of the river.

During Holding's superintendency the missionary effort was strengthened to include seven buildings on twenty-six acres. During the revolutionary decade of the 1910s Holding Institute provided a safe haven for residential students from Mexico and for missionaries who wished to relocate to the US side of the Rio Grande.

Holding Institute continued as a school until 1983 when it closed. In 1987 it reopened as a community center. Nannie Holding's service thus continues to be honored.