Abbe Female Institute

Lebanon, Wilson Co.

Isabella Francis Chrisman’s (1832-1907) was the daughter of Susan Cornell. Her father has not yet been identified. Her parents were married circa 1831. Isabella married William B. King, a retailer, in 1851. They had eight children. The Kings moved to Arkansas, Nevada, and ultimately California. One night in 1884 a very inebriated William King knifed a man to death in a saloon. He was tried and sentenced to San Quentin Prison where he died of pneumonia in 1890. Shortly afterwards Isabella married George Wimer, a fruit farmer. She died in 1907.

Isabella’s sampler is neatly balanced and carefully worked. Rather than the usual three-sided or four-sided border, she has worked matching borders on each vertical side, a different pattern across the bottom, and a trio of red flowers across the top.

Photograph courtesy of M. Finkel & Daughter, Philadelphia.