Isabel Mann Lenssen, 90, Was Summer Resident

Isabel Mann Lenssen of San Luis Obispo, Calif. and a former summer resident of Edgartown, died peacefully Jan. 26 of this year. She was 90.

She was born in Highland Park, Ill. in 1913 and attended Roycemore School in Evanston and the Art Institute of Chicago. Following graduation, Mrs. Lenssen worked for both her aunt, as an interior decorator, and her architect father before moving to New York city.

During the war, she volunteered for service as a SPAR in the U.S. Coast Guard and was stationed at Norfolk, Va. where she met her husband, Arthur Lenssen Jr. Mr. Lenssen grew up spending his summers on the Vineyard where the Lenssen family were members of the Edgartown Yacht Club. Arthur Jr. was one of the club's great sailors racing sneakboxes and virtually anything else that sailed. In 1945, he brought his fiancee, Isabel Mann, to the Island for the first time to meet his parents who lived on the end of Planting Field Way where the family owned several houses all built by Arthur Lenssen Sr.

Her next visit to the Island was in 1946 as a bride. The following summer her daughter, Isabel, was born.

Mrs. Lenssen spent every summer on the Vineyard until 1967 when she and Mr. Lenssen were separated. She also lived in Coconut Grove, Fla. where young Isabel was in school; Montserrat where she became interested in advancing Sea Island Cotton; and finally in Winter Park before moving to California. In California she was a docent at museums, taught children's art classes, played bridge and enjoyed Elderhostels.

Mrs. Lenssen is survived by her daughter, Isabel Browning Lenssen of Berkeley, Calif.; two grandsons, Alexander Lenssen Shinn of Virgin Gorda and Jonathan Mayhew Shinn of Maryville; and two sisters, Margaret Williams of Scottsdale, Ariz. and Priscilla Graham of San Luis Obispo, Calif.