Dennis R. Holman

Dennis Robert “Denny” Holman, 85, of Sedalia, passed away Tuesday, December 31, 2024, in Columbia.

He was born May 7, 1939, on the family farm north of Sedalia, the second child of Robert H. and Wilma I. (Rodewald) Holman, who also lived their entire lives on the farm.

Denny was married to his wife Donna (Rothgeb) Meekins on November 26, 1984, and they recently celebrated their 40th anniversary. 

Denny is survived by his sister, Donna Humble (age 89) of Osage Beach, MO; his wife, Donna Holman, of the home; his son, Grant Holman and daughter-in-law, Stacy Holman, who reside on the family farm as well. Dennis is also survived by two daughters, Juanita Hargis and Sherri Jones of KC, MO; a stepson, Harry Donnellan, of Sedalia; a stepson, Randy Meekins, of Surprise, AZ; a stepdaughter, Denise Bryan, of Columbia, MO; and recently an honorary adopted daughter, Patty Gerke, of Boonville, MO who has been an angel amongst us the past several months. 

In addition to this immediate family Denny is survived by a huge family who loves him dearly including nine grandchildren: Ricky, Allison, Chastity, Hunter, Ethan, Brandi, Anthony, Nicholas, and Linsey; ten great-grandchildren; and two great-great-grandchildren. 

Denny was the fourth generation to live and work on the Holman Family Farm which was founded in 1890 and is still active and growing today. His son, Grant, is the fifth generation to carry on this legacy which was Denny’s life’s work. Denny added land to the farm during his lifetime which today totals over 900 acres. 

Denny attended a one-room schoolhouse on Woodland Road until the fifth grade, at which time he moved to Smithton School to finish his education. He graduated high school in 1957. Denny then joined the Marines in 1958 in lieu of the draft. He served in Okinawa, Japan between the Korean and Vietnam Wars and was a proud lifelong Marine. Semper Fi were words that meant something to him, and he always felt a kinship with others who had served their country in all branches of the military. After coming home from the corps, Denny toured the nation with his friend Larry Gunner (deceased) of North Dakota. They traveled from one end of the nation to the other before coming back to their respective homes to pick up again with the work to be done on their respective family farms. 

In 1962, Denny picked up his second job with Moorman’s Mfg Co selling livestock feed supplies. He was in the top 100 club for the nation’s highest volume sellers of Moorman’s feed for nearly every year of his thirty three-year career in the feed business. Along with this career, he built the first of two 2-mile levees on Muddy Creek bottom, farrowed and finished over 5,000 head of hogs per year, cared for a 100 plus cow herd, and row cropped the family farm. Denny retired from Moorman’s in 1993 and began his very eventful thirty plus years of “retirement”

For the last ten years Denny has been working back at the farm doing what he’s always loved in the place that he is most proud of. In 2016 Grant and Denny had a logger out to harvest the logs on the Holman Farm for the first time since its inception. Denny spent the next five years cutting up the tops that he and the family turned into more than 300 cords of split firewood, and getting grass sowed on the more than two miles of wooded trails and food plots on the north end of the property. With this accomplished, Denny and Grant, with the help of Stacy and the kids, started a small outfitting business which has seen visitors arrive from five states including Louisiana, Mississippi, Oklahoma, Wisconsin, Michigan, and UP Michigan. Denny’s most recent and most crowning achievement was purchasing the last of, and finishing, the bottom to the south to complete the dream he and his father started over seventy years ago. In 2022 Denny and Grant and family finished sowing grass and picking up roots to finalize the addition of another two-mile levee to protect the south bottom from Muddy Creek. 

Denny will be fondly remembered for his determination to care for future generations, his work ethic and constant belief that anything worth doing is worth doing your very best, his ability to love unconditionally, and his love for the legacy of the family farm that lives on into the sixth and seventh generations. He and Grant agreed on the continued dream of growing the farm and set it up to live on to be a two-century farm. 

Funeral services will be held at 2:00 p.m. Saturday, January 4, 2025, at Heckart Funeral Home, where the family will receive friends from 1:00 p.m. until service time.

Casket bearers will be Ricky Holman, Hunter Holman, Ethan Holman, Blake DeWitt, Dustin Brown, and Gage Williams.

Honorary bearers will be Chad DeWitt, Dave DeWitt, Chris Brown, Robbie Ramey, Dustin LeGrant, and Greg Frantz.

Burial with military honors will be in Memorial Park Cemetery.

In lieu of flowers, memorials are suggested to Caring Hearts and Hands, 1307 W. Broadway, Columbia, MO 65203, or Hopewell Baptist Church, in care of Heckart Funeral Home.