Claudia Holt

Claudia Margaret Holt (nee. Blythe; formerly McAllister) (b. 29th December 1947) has been a resident of North Grove since 1977.

Claudia is the wife of Stanley Holt, mother of Millie Dickinson and Ivy Jones and the grandmother of Lola, Cameron, Amber, Mia, Alyssa, Kiera and Nicole.

Childhood
Claudia was born in Chicago, Illinois, USA in 1947 to Fred and Shirley Blythe, a very wealthy family in the US. She was the first born and was set to inherit the family fortune. As such, she was sent to the best schools and barely had a relationship with her parents or siblings - Jessica who was born in 1949 and William who was born in 1956. Claudia grew up mainly in New York City, where she attended her whole academic career. She was closer to her grandmother who lived there but her grandmother died when Claudia was thirteen years old, much to her distraught. She was close with her nannies but her lack of a relationship with her parents disturbed her.

First Marriage
In 1965, Claudia asked her parents if they would allow her to attend college. She had a dream of completing a college degree in fashion. Her mentor at her high school had gone onto Parson's School of Design and she wanted to follow after her. She loved New York and she knew that if she didn't go to college, she would have to move back to Chicago which she didn't want to.

Despite her unwillingness, her parents turned up for her graduation with her siblings and a man named Buddy McAllister who was seven years her senior.

She knew what it meant. Her parents sat her down and told her that she would not receive her inheritance if she didn't marry him. He was the heir to a large fortune in oil and their marriage would establish her own family and attract a suitable husband for her sister Jessica.

In the Autumn of 1965, Claudia walked down the aisle for the first time in a lavish ceremony in Chicago that included guests such as Elizabeth Taylor and Audrey Hepburn.

The marriage wasn't a very happy one. Claudia did her best to make her husband unhappy and it wasn't long before they were sleeping in separate beds and only spending time together at important functions.

In the Spring of 1966, he brought up the subject of children. He wanted at least four and Claudia was suddenly spooked. She thought she had more time. During the night of April 22nd 1966, Claudia packed a suitcase and escaped in the night. She had been withdrawing money from their accounts in small amounts and her sister had been doing the same and when she had enough, she bought a ticket and flew to London.

London
Claudia arrived in London with nowhere to go. She knew that Buddy's sister Missy had once lived here but she tragically passed away during childbirth two years beforehand in 1964. Buddy had missed his sister a lot and she felt sorry for him a great deal. They had honeymooned in Europe and went to visit Buddy's nephew and brother-in-law Roger Hackman for a few days in London before travelling to Paris and Barcelona.

She had enjoyed her time, travelling but she just didn't enjoy her time being married. She felt stifled and she mainly took out her frustrations at not being able to go to college and her distaste over her parents on him.

She found herself a small, rented flat just out of the London City Centre and started to work as a personal assistant at a small music studio. She enjoyed the work, but things changed for her dramatically when she was discovered by an exec who was dropping by.

The exec thought she was gorgeous and soon signed her up to a modelling agency. Being swept up in the glory and excitement, Claudia loved the attention.

It wasn't long before she was hanging out with the Rolling Stones and Twiggy, Lulu and the rest. She completed her first catwalk for Gucci in the autumn of 1966 and became 'the new biggest star in fashion'.

Her spirit was dampened however, when news of her new job hit her parents and husband in New York. None of them knew where she was and it was Roger who informed them of what had happened. They flew to London with her sister Jessica.

She wasn't happy to see them. She loved her new life and offered to divorce Buddy quietly. He refused. He didn't want the scandal. He explained to her that he had to tell all of their friends that she had taken ill and was in California visiting relatives. She became frustrated with them, not wanting to speak with any of her family again.

A month later, all four of them flew back to the States. Her sister and mother was in tears but it was what Buddy did that almost flat-lined her career. He leaked to the press about their marriage and gave an interview explaining about how she had fled in the night. Calling her ungrateful and selfish for denying herself a comfortable life while people suffered with no money.

The media began to call her out, Gucci dropped her from their Spring/ Summer line-up for 1967 and nobody would hire her. They wanted to show her as the innocent, virgin girl that women wanted to be and men wanted. With her marriage leaked, she couldn't portray that side for them anymore.

By the Spring of 1967, she was starting to become desperate. Luckily, The Rolling Stones invited her to tour with them around Europe. She mainly hung with the other models and girls touring with them but she did occasionally share a bed with Mick Jagger.

When the tour ended, her marriage had been seemingly forgotten. She still hung around with the models and singers and actresses and slowly, her face began to enter into the newspapers and magazines again. Chanel picked her up and by 1968, she was modelling again.

When Buddy realised that his sabotage had not gone as well as he had planned, he sent the divorce papers in the post and by the summer of 1969, her first marriage had ended.

Second Marriage
Claudia's stardom only got higher. She adapted with the times, becoming a hippie, attending Woodstock, going to the funerals of Jimi Hendrix, Jim Morrison and Brian Jones of the Stones. She dabbled in a few recreational drugs and drank until she was in hospital. She loved it.

She didn't believe life could get better. She felt accomplished and when she was asked to talk about her career to some students in Manchester in 1975, she jumped at the chance.

She was to speak to eight different classes over two weeks so she booked herself a room at the Midland Hotel. While staying there, she started talking to a handyman who was re-decorating the room next to hers. He was called Stanley Holt and the two hit it off.

He was two years older than her and he reminded her of the complete opposite to Buddy. He was different to the men she hung around with as well and he was genuinely funny and he looked at her like she could change the world.

She stayed in Manchester beyond her scheduled two weeks and the two ended up dating. It was only two months later when she was called back to work for the New York Fashion Week that she had to leave him. She recalled that month in the Autumn of 1975 as her most miserable. She knew what new life she had behind her in Manchester and she was itching to go back.

While in New York, she met up with her family and spent time with her siblings. She even bumped into Buddy who had since remarried and had the son he always wanted. She was happy for him and she knew it was because of Stanley. Before him, she had always felt bitter for what he nearly did to her career but when she saw him, she didn't care anymore.

When she got back, it was only a month after that Stanley proposed to her. She was shocked. She explained to him about her previous marriage and how she wanted her career before children and he understood that.

Claudia began to take jobs only in the UK or jobs that only required her from being away from home a couple of days at the most. She began a degree in Dentistry, a subject she had been interested in since she had her own done in the 60's.

In 1977, she took Stanley to Chicago to meet her family. Her mother was happy to see her but she was deeply hurt when she found out that Buddy had committed suicide the year before and nobody told her. His second wife divorced him after she found out he had been married to the famous 'Claudia Blythe' and he blamed Claudia for everything that went wrong in his life and killed himself.

She was deeply affected by this revelation and it marred the rest of her trip back to the USA. For the rest of her life, she took Buddy with her. She felt horrible about herself and she started to change dramatically. She saw life as more than drugs, love and rock n roll. She became more introverted and left for England again.

In December 1977, in front of only a few friends and family, she and Stanley married.

Motherhood
In 1979, she discovered she was pregnant. She only had a few months left of her degree and her career in modelling had ended. She kept it a secret from Stanley as she decided what to do. She didn't initially want the child but she decided to keep it after speaking with her husband and them both realising that this was a good thing for them.

Also during that year, Claudia received a letter from her old brother-in-law Roger Hackman. She was shocked but he had invited her and Stanley up to his house in North Grove. Curious, they both went.

Roger had a necklace that Buddy had intended to give to Claudia when he came to London to fight for her. He had given it to Roger for safe keeping but never came back for it. He had been trying to track down Claudia and it was only when he found out she had settled down in Manchester that he found her address to send a letter.

She was touched by it but after what she discovered about Buddy and his total hatred for her, she declined the necklace and suggested that he send it back to New York to go to his son who was at this point only six years old. He agreed.

As Claudia and Stanley looked around the town of North Grove, they both realised it was the perfect town for their new family. It was barely a half an hour drive from Manchester and it was a nice town full of quirks that you didn't get in their flat in Manchester.

Buying a house, they settled down and in the November of 1979, Claudia gave birth to a daughter they named Millie. The three of them were happy and welcomed another daughter Ivy in 1981.

Claudia wasn't the typical mother, she had always been quite cold, especially since finding out about Buddy and she sometimes found that hard to convey her love for her daughters to them. Stanley was always much warmer and the girls both loved their father more that Claudia. She found that hard to deal with and the more they went to their father in times of trouble, the more resentful Claudia became.

Grandmother Claudia
In 1998, Millie came home, sat down her parents and told them that she was pregnant. Claudia, who had never wanted children for such a long time and who wanted better for them, to have a life like she had freaked. She shouted at her daughter and when Millie refused to have an abortion, she stopped talking to her daughter.

She packed a suitcase for her and Ivy and she took them both to Chicago to see her family. She didn't know how to cope so she did what she knew best and ran away.

It was in the middle of September when she returned back, mainly because Ivy had to attend school, and she still hadn't calmed down when she saw her daughter and her boyfriend Oliver Dickinson living at home. Stanley was okay with it and Claudia was outraged.

Stanley advised that he was the result of a teenage pregnancy and he turned out okay but she was still upset. Her husband hadn't taken her side and she felt betrayed. When her granddaughter was born, Claudia refused to see her. She put a deposit down for Millie, Oliver and baby Mia on a flat in North Grove and told them to move out.

This forced the nineteen and twenty year old couple to find jobs and fast. Her treatment of Millie made Ivy angry. She had always been close with her elder sister and seeing this made Ivy admit to her dating Sean Jones who was four years her senior.

Claudia was on the verge of mental breakdown. She called for her sister Jessica to come and when Jessica, her husband Robert and their three children arrived in North Grove, she broke apart. They both appeared to have the same rebellious nature that Claudia had and it was the one thing she'd hoped the would never inherit.

She was devastated and it started to put a strain on her marriage. Stanley had always been more laid back and the two complimented each other which is why they worked so well. It was the first major test of their relationship since Claudia first discovered her pregnancy in 1979.

Ivy moved out to Sean's parents and when Claudia went round to retrieve her daughter, she got into a fight with Sean's mother Helen Jones after Claudia called Sean undeserving of her daughter and scum. Sean was the step-grandson of Roger Hackman but that didn't stop her fury. Sean had been getting into a lot of fights and was causing trouble which is why she didn't want her daughter hanging around him.

2000's
In 2000, Ivy was stabbed in the pub toilets. She miscarried a child she didn't know she was carrying and it made Claudia step up completely. She realised how terrible of a mother she had been and rushed to the hospital. She was glad when she noticed Sean wasn't there and she cared for her daughter as she stayed in the hospital.

Their relationship became less strained but when Claudia realised that she and Sean were still together, she was hurt. She was more hurt when she found out they were moving to London to get away from North Grove and their families. She was happy that Sean was taking his education seriously for the first time in his life but she was still upset at them leaving.

She knew Ivy wanted to be a hairdresser so she rang around her old contacts, who she stayed in touch with, and got her daughter an important job in the centre of London which paid highly and was one of the best salon's in London.

With Ivy gone, her relationship with her older daughter remained strained. They only lived a few houses away from each other but Claudia and Millie refused to acknowledge each other. Even when Stanley showed her photos of her granddaughters she didn't go to see her.

It was in 2008, when tragedy struck and Millie's husband Oliver was killed in Afghanistan that Claudia went to visit her daughter. The two began to sweep things under the rug while she consoled her daughter and helped her through her grief. It wasn't long before she had a relationship with both her daughters again and her grandchildren, of which she now had seven.

In 2010, Roger died of a heart attack, much to her sadness.

In 2012, Ivy, Sean and her children Lola, Cameron and Amber returned to North Grove and she enjoyed having her family around her again. She retired the same year from dentistry and began to babysit more for for her grandchildren and also made trips to London and New York to comment on current fashion trends, making friends with people she had lost contact with in the seventies and starting to get her own life back.

Her marriage with Stanley is as strong as ever and he travels with her whenever she needs to.

Family
Mother: Shirley Blythe

Father: Fred Blythe

Siblings: Jessica Saunders and William Blythe

Husband: Stanley Holt (1977-)

Ex-Husband: Buddy McAllister (1965 - 1969)

Children: Millie Dickinson and Ivy Jones

Grandchildren: Mia, Alyssa, Kiera, Nicole, Lola, Cameron and Amber

Niece: Lindsay Evans

Nephews: Justin and Warren Saunders and Mark Blythe