Daniel Henry Holmes

Daniel Henry Holmes (April 28, 1816 – July 3, 1898) was born in the Point Pleasant area of Clermont County, Ohio. Orphaned at age 2, he lacked any formal education. But at the time of his death in 1898, he was fluent in French, German and Spanish, and his New Orleans department store was the largest in the South, with over 700 employees. Holmes often said he owed his success as a store operator to his belief in selling only the best merchandise. He traveled extensively across the country, and to Europe, searching out the products he sold. It was in part his travel between New York and New Orleans in the early 1850s that led Holmes to decide that Covington, Kentucky would make a good rest stop. Holmes bought land in the Kenton County area known as Buena Vista and in 1866 began to build the home of his dreams, a three-story, English-gothic castle which he named Holmesdale. Holmesdale was a 32-room mansion built on about 17 acres (69,000 m2). In 1919 after Holmes' death, it was sold by the Holmes family to the Covington Board of Education for $50,000. The site is now part of the Holmes Junior/Senior High School campus. Holmes divided his time between Holmesdale, a home in France and an apartment he had in New Orleans. Holmes died on July 3, 1898, while on a business trip to New York. His personal estate was valued at more than $1.2 million. Holmes' obituary ran on the front page of The Kentucky Post on July 4, 1898. The article called Holmes "The King of New Orleans retailers" and the “richest man in Covington”.