Kate Holbrook died in Salt Lake City on August 20, 2022, at the age of 50 after battling rare cancer of the eye.
Kate Holbrook was a historian and writer who worked as the managing historian of women’s history in the Church History Department (CHD) of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church).
She was born in Santa Barbara, California, on January 13, 1972 to Kathleen Stewart and Robert Holbrook.
Holbrook was raised by her mother and her grandmother, Belle Fillmore Stewart, in Provo, Utah.
Kate Holbrook served as an LDS Church missionary from 1993 to 1994 in Samara, Russia.
After serving a Church mission to Samara Russia and graduating from Brigham Young University, she moved to Boston because she’d loved a rainy afternoon spent there when she was 13. There she worked at Boston University, graduated from Harvard Divinity School with a Master of Divinity, and began a doctorate in Religious Studies at Boston University.
She also met and married Sam Brown. In their middle 30s they realized that they were at heart mountain people and returned to Utah.
In Utah, Kate completed her PhD (remotely) and started her career as a historian of Latter-day Saint women, employed by the Church History Department of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. She edited and/or wrote many books, articles, and other expressions of her careful thought and warm caring. She paid special attention in her scholarship to the relationships between food and the religious community.
She was one of two historians who joined Elder Quentin L. Cook, of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, in speaking to young adults about church history topics in a “Face to Face” broadcast in 2018.
Kate Holbrook is survived by her husband Samuel Brown and three daughters; Amelia, Lucia, and Persephone Holbrook-Brown.
Instead of flowers, the family is encouraging well-wishers to donate to the Kate Holbrook Endowed Scholarship Fund at BYU for primary caregivers of children pursuing graduate work in humanities, according to an obituary posted on her website.