Sara Allen (Plummer) Lemmon (1836 - 1923)

Born 3 Sep 1836 in New Gloucester, Cumberland, Maine, United States

Ancestors

Wife of John Gill Lemmon — married 1880 in California

Died 15 Jan 1923 at age 86 in Oakland, Alameda, California, United States

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Biography

Sara (Plummer) Lemmon is Notable.

Sara (Plummer) Lemmon was born in Maine.

Sara served as a nurse for two years at Bellevue Hospital caring for wounded soldiers in the US Civil War era. Honored for eternity: In Memoriam

Sara (Plummer) Lemmon was a Californian.

Sara was born on 3 Sep 1836 to parents Micajah Plummer and Elizabeth Haskell in New Gloucester, Cumberland County, Maine as their third child and first-born daughter. ^[1]

13-year-old Sara was a student along with her siblings now including a younger sister and brother at the 1850 Census. The family lives in New Gloucester with her paternal grandfather and another elderly relative, Martha Tucker, possibly her aunt: ^[2]

She attended teachers college in Worcester, Massachusetts, and then moved to Manhattan, where she taught art at Grammar School No. 14 and studied at the Cooper Union to become certified in Chemistry and Physics while supporting herself by teaching calisthenics (gym) and giving art lessons.

During the Civil War, she nursed wounded soldiers for two years at Bellevue Hospital. Ironically, her own health was terrible, and after barely surviving pneumonia, she realized her life depended on escaping the bitter Northeastern winters.

In 1869 on her own, Sara moved cross-country to Santa Monica, California, where she established a stationery shop and lending library. (This article gives a fascinating biography.) Missing intellelectual stimulation she enjoyed back East, she opened the store for art exhibits and lectures.

In 1876, Sara met her future husband, botanist John Gill Lemmon, a former Union soldier and prisoner of the infamous Andersonville prison camp in Georgia, at a lecture he gave. She began painting various flora and fauna and delved into botany, a subject she studied in Worcester, and corresponded with John often. She sent him a sample of a bush she found near Santa Monica that he examined and named as a new species, Baccharis plummerae, after her. This "sealed the deal" and they married in 1880. Sara and John never had children, instead devoting their lives to their love of botany and making significant discoveries in this field.

She gave the shop to the Odd Fellows to manage, and they began traveling and documenting botanical discoveries starting with their honeymoon in the Santa Catalina Mountains near Tucson, Arizona in 1881. ^[3]

Sara & John in their Arizona Camp

"Sara assisted her husband in an ambitious effort to catalog the plants of southern Arizona, a part of the world few botanists had yet visited. Sara and John were equal partners in collecting and researching plant specimens, but in the scientific papers and articles they published credit was given to ‘J.G. Lemmon and Wife. "^[4]

"On that trip, Sara Plummer Lemmon – a slender, dark-haired woman of 45 – traveled to the old Spanish Pueblo called Tucson with her husband on the first train to reach the town. While documenting and painting plants in the nearby Santa Catalina Mountains, Sara and John decided to climb the tallest peak that looms over Tucson." ^[4]

"Their first attempt to find a route up the south face failed. The walls of rock were very steep and hazardous. Thorns and cactus spines tore their hands and legs. Even the wildlife was daunting. They returned to Tucson where one of the native people told them to go around the mountain range to the small village of Oracle on the north side and talk to rancher Emerson O. Stratton at the Pandora Ranch. He agreed to guide them and provided them with horses to make the journey easier. Their guide later wrote in his reminiscences:"^[4]

"We went to the highest peak of the Santa Catalina’s and christen[ed] it Mt. Lemmon in honor of Mrs. Lemmon, who was the first white woman up there. I chopped the bark off a great pine tree on the very top and we all carved our names."^[4]

After this trip they returned to Santa Monica and Sara sold her store. She and John devoted their lives to botany and their work was groundbreaking, and her beautiful artwork enhanced John's many publications for their West Coast botanical discoveries.

Sara Plummer Lemmon wrote the following articles:

• "The Ferns of the Pacific Slope" (San Francisco, 1882)
• "Silk Culture in California" (1884)
• "Marine Botany" (1886)
• Marine Algae of the West
• Western Ferns

"Due to her extensive work in botany, the standard author abbreviation, Plummer, is used to indicate this person as the author when citing a botanical name."^[5]

"John and Sara co-developed the Lemmon Herbarium in their home at 5985 Telegraph Avenue in Oakland, California, which they later donated to the University of California, Berkeley, where it was merged into and called the University and Jepson Herbaria." ^[4]

From 1888 to 1892, Sara served as the official artist for the California State Board of Forestry gaining national fame for her exquisite illustrations. She lectured about forest conservation at the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago, and was responsible for the adoption of the golden poppy as the state flower of California.

John died 28 Nov 1908, and Sara grieved deeply, never getting over his loss as the love of her life. Sara continued illustrating and lecturing until her death on 15 Jan 1923 at her home.

The Herbaria there is gone, but the home and windmill still exist, currently as 5977-5981 Telegraph Rd, Oakland, California in this fascinating article. ^[6].

Sara and John are interred together in the Mountain View Cemetery in Oakland, California. Thier gravestone declare them "Partners in Botany," and state her persistence in naming the state flower of California.How fitting that the two of them are buried together. ^[4] Their gravestone reads: “Partners in Botany.” Find A Grave: Memorial #21712917 ^[7]

Research Notes

Records show Sara's name as Sarah in the 1850 Census and others.

Sources

1. ↑ "Maine Vital Records, 1670-1921," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:2HV5-DNY : 2 March 2021), Sarah A Plummer, 03 Sep 1836; citing New Gloucester, , Maine, United States, multiple sources, Maine; FHL microfilm.
2. ↑ "United States Census, 1850," database with images, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:M6JL-3N4 : 22 December 2020), Sara Plummer in household of Micajah S Plummer, New Gloucester, Cumberland, Maine, United States; citing family , NARA microfilm publication (Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, n.d.).
3. ↑ Wikipedia article.
4. ↑ ^{4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4 4.5} Women History Blog
5. ↑ Wikipedia
6. ↑ LocalWiki
7. ↑ Find a Grave, database and images (accessed 16 January 2021), memorial page for Sara Allen Plummer Lemmon (3 Sep 1836–1923), Find A Grave: Memorial #21712917, citing Mountain View Cemetery, Oakland, Alameda County, California, USA ; Maintained by countedx58 (contributor 46619236) .

See also:

• Wikipedia
• Independent.com article
• California Beat article