My wife’s maternal grandfather was many things: a wartime pilot, a suave businessman, and a notorious interstate stick-up man. He was handsome and charming, the son of Swedish immigrants, and until he was convicted and sent to prison, his was the kind of success story people remember from the 1950s.
There is probably a lesson to be learned from that story.
Growing Up in Lake Wobegon
For some 30 years on public radio, Garrison Keillor would tell stories about a fictional “hometown, out there on the edge of the prairie,” ending each week by saying, “That’s the news from Lake Wobegon, where all the women are strong, all the men are good-looking, and all the children are above average.”
Mahtomedi, Minnesota, where Bud Holmquist was born, sits about 20 minutes northeast of the state capital, St. Paul, and calls itself “A Very Large Town City.” It is about 10 times larger now than in 1940, so one has to wonder whether stories like Keillor’s Lake Wobegon tales might not have resonated on the shores of White Bear Lake, where the Holmquists kept their home.
Bud’s full name was Arvid Wesley Holmquist, and he was born in Mahtomedi on 6 September 1920. He grew up with two older sisters, Ruth and Lillian, and a younger sister, Dorothy. Their father, Arvid William, was a custodian in the public schools. He had immigrated from Sweden when he was in his late twenties, and became a naturalized citizen in 1921.
As Bud was William’s only son, we can imagine how proud he was when the young man landed an engineering job, which sent him to Iran for a year in 1942. When he came back from his year abroad, Bud married Merilyn Martin, the daughter of Howard Martin, a prominent businessman in Omaha. They were married in February 1943, and soon after, Bud was inducted into the air corps at Fort Snelling.1
Down In Flames
By all accounts, Bud enjoyed the adventure of being a pilot in the war. Afterward, he came home with prospects. He went to work for his father-in-law and was a successful salesman. He and Merilyn had two daughters, and by the end of 1950, one might think he had attained the American Dream.
The story, as it was handed down to me, is that his girls wanted for nothing. Pretty dresses, expensive toys, including a child-sized car with a working gasoline motor for them to drive around! But by 1959, something gave way. In May 1961, newspapers across the Midwest reported the capture of the “Executive Bandit”2:
Omaha (AP)–Arvid Wesley Holmquist, a 40-year-old salesman who told police he gave up a $13,000 a year job [about $144,796.77 in 2026] to become a bandit, was arrested Sunday as he sipped coffee in an Omaha restaurant.
Police said he made statements about a dozen holdups in 7 states, including one Lincoln stickup. The loot ranged from $45 to $26,000. The biggest take, Holmquist told police, was in his first holdup at the Younkers-Davidson Department Store in Sioux City, Iowa [on September 29, 1959].
The victims of the robberies listed had described the bandit as a calm, executive type.
He said his formula was to wear a business suit and walk slowly, adding: “I always dressed good. If you want to be a stickup man, don’t wear a black leather jacket.”
Referring to his formula, he said in the Sioux City holdup, he was walking out of the store with most of the day’s receipts in a bulging satchel and an employee opened the door for him.
Bud admitted to about a dozen holdups he committed in seven states in 1960 and 1961:
- Kilpatrick’s Store, Omaha, April 21, 1960, $1,900
- Interstate Finance Co., Omaha, Aug. 1, 1960, $1,000
- American Loan Co., Omaha, Sept. 19, 1960, about $100
- Murphy Finance Co., Lincoln, Aug. 23, 1960, $1,700
- Murphy Finance Co., Wichita, Kan., fall 1960, $200
- Interstate Finance Co., North Kansas City, fall 1960, $200
- Dial Finance Co., St. Joseph, Mo., April 1961, $850
- A finance company in Rock Island, Ill., in the fall of 1960
- A finance company in Phoenix, Ariz., in March 1961
In total, Bud stole about $35,000, equivalent to about $389,837 today. “Asked what he did with the money, he replied, ‘I was trying to drown everything that happened.’ He added that he bought some race horses and did ‘quite a bit’ of betting.”
I had always been told that his arrest ended his marriage, but the newspapers suggest that things happened the other way around. According to Bud, he was working as a salesman for an Oshkosh, Wis., clothing firm when he “got disgusted…. I gave up working…There was a divorce coming up. I didn’t care what happened and had a rather negative attitude at the time.” By the time he was arrested, he was living in a residential hotel, and said, “I was almost hoping I’d get caught and get it over with.” Detectives said he had $20.01 on his person when he was arrested.
Paying the Cost
Bud pleaded guilty to all of his crimes. He was sentenced to nine years by the Douglas County District Court on 25 May 1961, and the Lancaster County District Court sentenced him to another 11 years on 12 September. In 1965, newspapers reported that he was being considered for “commutation to detainer,” which meant that he could be given clemency in Nebraska, only to answer to other jurisdictions. Authorities wanted him in Phoenix, Arizona, and Wichita, Kansas.
It’s hard to know when he was released from prison, but there is a 1974 divorce record for an Arvid W. Holmquist in Orange County, California, that might be him. Clark County, Nevada, records from 1979 and 1982 suggest that he was married to Hallie Harp for three years, and public records show him at a Las Vegas address in 1991.
Bud Holmquist died in Las Vegas on 10 August 1996. He is buried in Union Cemetery in Maplewood, Ramsey County, Minnesota.
As far as I know, he had no contact with his family, even though his sisters, Lil and Dot, outlived him until 2004 and 2008, respectively. I do know that his wife and daughters never forgave him.
But that isn’t my story to tell.
- The Daily Nonpareil, Council Bluffs, Iowa; Sun, Feb 14, 1943, Page 11. ↩︎
- Sioux City Journal, Sioux City, Iowa; Monday, May 15, 1961, Page:1. ↩︎
Mightier Acorns 
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