[2] Holm is best known for his attempt, in 1907, to "obtain" the famous Nestorian Stele - an ancient Christian monument of Xi'an, in Northwestern China, and sell it to a Western museum.

Alerted to his activities (nicknamed by later writers the "Holm-Nestorian expedition to Xi'an"), the local authorities moved the monument from its outdoor location on the western outskirts of the city, and into the Stele Forest museum.

In order not to leave China empty-handed, the disappointed Holm had an exact copy of the stele made for him in Xi'an.

The museum's director Caspar Purdon Clarke, however, was less than enthusiastic about purchasing "so large a stone ... of no artistic value".

[2] Eventually, in 1917, Mrs. George Leary, a wealthy New Yorker, purchased the replica stele and sent it to Rome, as a gift to the Pope.