BATAVIA, IL (September 2, 2015) — Isabella Sandquist, widow of Covenant minister Richard (Dick) Sandquist, died August 23. She was 103.
She was born on August 8, 1912, to Atarius and Jenny Carlson in Youngstown, Ohio, and raised in Boardman, Ohio.
During the Great Depression, Isabella worked as a secretary at her former school and helped to support her mother and six siblings. Her father had died when she was 11.
She started the Young People’s Group at First Covenant Church in Youngstown, which eventually became a regional camping ministry.
She later worked at North Park University with multiple responsibilities that included serving as assistant to the school’s vice president and overseeing student services.
She married Dick on August 26, 1944.
They first served the Covenant congregation in Stotler-Osage City, Kansas, where their small income was supplemented with chickens and eggs. They went on to serve in Beloit, Wisconsin; Renton, Washington; Sacramento, Pasadena, and Fresno, California; Springfield, Massachusetts; Urbandale, Iowa; and Arvada, Colorado before moving to the Covenant Shores Retirement Center in Mercer Island, Washington, where Dick served as chaplain.
Dick died in 1990. Shortly after his death, Isabella moved to the Holmstad.
Survivors include three daughters, Priscilla Abrahamson, Rebecca Risk, and Sara Forsman; and four sons, Ted, Tim, Tom, and Mark Atarius.
Services will be held at 1:30 p.m. Monday, September 14, at the Holmstad. Memorials may be sent there.
What a blessing to know Dick and Isabelle Sandquist.
They brought us into the Covenant over 55 years ago.
Isabelle’s was a life well lived.
Peace to her memory and comfort to each of the children.
The Sandquists were the embodiment of pastoral ministry. My mother never forgot that Pastor Sandquist came to visit her mother in the hospital in Sacramento on Christmas Day in 1954, the day before her mother passed away. My mother was always grateful for that exceptional kindness from both the pastor and the sacrifice of his family.