Linda Holz

Linda Ganter Holz

March 29, 1946 (Hartford, Connecticut) – October 26, 2008 (Atlanta, Georgia)

‘Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth....’ (Revelation 21:1)

  Linda Ganter Holz saw her way to beauty.  Her eyes pulled hidden visual treasures from common places, balanced compositions from disparate ingredients. She could look at chaos and imagine rearranging it into sublime order.  To be with Linda was to have her draw your own eyes to the striking colors, contours, and combinations of the environment she inhabited and created.  What she touched and transformed with her hands became pleasure to our eyes. 

  The eldest daughter of Harry and Lois Ganter, Linda grew up in Wethersfield, Connecticut, an old colonial town just south of Hartford.  The Ganters are descendants of seventeenth-century Dutch and English immigrants who settled in New York City (originally New Amsterdam), in the late eighteenth century moved to St. John, New Brunswick, and in the 1920s to Hartford, Connecticut. 

  Linda attended Southern Connecticut University and earned her BS in Art Education and an MS in Early Childhood.  This marriage of art and education laid the foundation for the path her calling would take.  She would spend her vocational life helping children to discover the sheer joy of creating something with canvas, clay, paper, and fiber, and to see how beauty and meaning inhabit art.  For thirty-five years – nine in elementary schools in Guilford, Connecticut and twenty-six at the Westminster School in Atlanta – she opened these doors for thousands of children.  One of them, now grown, recently wrote: ‘My affection for you, Linda, as my teacher and mentor, is deep and genuine.  The opportunities and lessons you gave me literally changed the course of my life, and I am forever grateful.  Thank you for all you taught me.  My path as an artist and teacher couldn’t have happened without you.’

  Over the years she taught at Westminster, Linda developed close friendships with fellow teachers, who had deep respect, not only for her artistic and teaching abilities, but also for her skill in pulling things together when there were still too many loose ends.  At Linda’s retirement from teaching, one colleague wrote: ‘Linda often gave her time and energy to assist others.  She is such an inventive problem-solver.  She came up with just the right creative solution to many a problem in the classroom and in the Elementary School at large.  We will all miss being able to say, “Let’s ask Linda; I’m sure she’ll know just what to do.”’ 

  The same generosity and the same gifts that made Linda a successful art teacher made her a valued member of her church, the Atlanta Temple Corps of The Salvation Army.  Over the past twenty-nine years, she has shared her visual artistry to enhance worship and to create sacred space for spiritual reflection.  She has also used her teaching skills to nurture faith and to mentor.  This congregation has been a spiritual family for Linda and a pillar of support during the difficult journey in cancer treatment over the past two years.

  Linda has not traveled this journey alone.  While serving as a young adult on a Salvation Army summer camp staff in Connecticut, she met Richard E. Holz.   Richard was studying to become a music educator. Forty-one years ago they married.  It was a marriage of art and music.  The art educator and the music educator were to become a force to be reckoned with, each complementing the other.  More importantly, it was a marriage of love and covenant.  Their vows remained true to the end.  Dick gave extraordinary care during these last years of Linda’s journey.

  Linda is survived by her devoted husband, Dr. Richard E. Holz, her sister, Ruth Ganter Rosenfield, and eight nieces and nephews: Rachael Rosenfield Adger, Robert Rosenfield, Joseph Rosenfield, Heather Needham Hawkins, Captain Holly Dawn Needham, Byron Richard Holz, Kathleen Joy Holz-Russell, and Cadet Gretchen Ann Holz.  All Linda’s family circle, friends, colleagues, and hundreds of students join together to thank God for a lady who pointed the way to beauty and who now can see what is beyond our imagination in the eternal presence of a loving God.    A celebration of life will be held Thursday, October 30th at 10:30AM at the Salvation Army Temple Corps.  Friends are invited to visit with the family from 9:00AM until service time in the Fireside Room at the Temple.

Those wishing to make a donation in memory of Linda may do so by sending it to the Richard and Linda Holz College Scholarship Fund, The Salvation Army Territorial Music Department, 1424 Northeast Expressway, Atlanta, GA 30329.  A. S. Turner & Sons