‘First lady of all things Lexington’: Former vice mayor Isabel Yates dies at 100

If you want to see the legacy that Isabel Yates left on her adopted home of Lexington, all you have to do is look around.

The Kentucky Theatre, McConnell Springs, Horse Mania, the flower baskets hanging on Main Street were all projects that Yates helped or made happen, using the honeyed South Carolina accent she never lost and the steel of an indomitable will to help and improve.

She was “the first lady of all things Lexington,” as former Mayor Jim Gray dubbed her.

She died Wednesday, Feb. 26, 2025, at the age of 100.

“Isabel was an amazing force for good, who had a huge impact on our community” Mayor Linda Gorton said. “A native of South Carolina, she was the true definition of a steel magnolia, approaching thorny issues with thoughtfulness and grace, but always with an iron resolve to do the right thing.

Yates came by her longevity naturally; her father was a doctor in Winnsboro, S.C., who practiced until he was 95 and lived to be 103.

She earned her bachelor’s degree from the University of South Carolina, where she was president of her chapter of Kappa Delta sorority, and a master’s degree in English from Ohio State University.

She and her husband, Eugene Wilson Yates, moved to Lexington in 1963. Wilson Yates was an executive and attorney with Kentucky Central Life Insurance.

Isabel Yates soon became involved in charity work; one profile of her said it would be easier to find organizations she wasn’t involved in than list the ones she was, everything from the Tates Creek PTA to Junior Achievement.

When she was 66, city politics soon came calling. She was elected to Lexington Fayette-Urban County Council in 1991, and in 1998 became vice mayor after Ann Ross and Pam Miller.

In 1993, she mounted a fund-raising campaign to buy an illegal dumping ground littered with roofing material and discarded appliances behind Lexington’s tobacco warehouses. She turned it into McConnell Springs, one of Lexington’s premier green spaces, full of bubbling pools and migratory birds.

In the 1990s, she was known as the Stormwater Queen at city hall because she paid so much attention to stormwater and runoff issues.

In 2012, she formed Friends of the Kentucky Theatre, helping raise more than $615,000 to refurbish one of Lexington’s most historic entertainment sites.

She also was a leader, along with the Lexington Arts & Cultural Council, in bringing the public art project Horse Mania to Lexington in 2000 and 2010 after hearing about Chicago’s Cows on Parade art project.

When Yates announced her retirement from the council in December 2011, supporters waved blue, orange and gold paper flags decorated with the names of the organizations she’d served, including the Children’s Museum, United Way and Lexington Philharmonic.

In 2001, the late at-large council member David Stevens, who called her a “steel magnolia,” adding: “She listens more than she talks, which is not true of most people.”

Former Mayor Jim Gray called Yates “certifiably one in a million.

“Her civic commitment was just unparalleled, along with her wisdom and good humor,” he said. “A bit of guidance she once offered me when I was maybe hearing only one side of the issue was this: ‘Now Jim, remember, even the thinnest pancake has two sides!’”

Even after she left politics, you could find Yates three times a week at the early morning exercise class at the High Street Y. Always immaculately dressed, she at 95 was part of a protest against KU’s tree-cutting practices in her Lansdowne neighborhood in 2021.

She celebrated her 100th birthday on Oct. 1, 2024, a date shared with former President Jimmy Carter.

Gorton called her a mentor and a friend.

“She was Vice Mayor during my first four years on Council, and I had the opportunity to learn from the best,” Gorton said. ‘You better be proud of the place where you live, and you should live so the place is proud of you,’ Isabel often said. Isabel, we were proud to know you.”

Yates was the widow of the late Eugene Wilson Yates. She is survived by one sister, her children Gene Yates (Sandra), St. Paul, MN, Isabel “Mackie” Hempel (Karl), Tallahassee, FL, Carolyn Y Cunningham, Lexington, KY, Elliott “Glenn” Yates (Erin) Charlotte, NC. She is also survived by her eight grandchildren.

The funeral will be held at Christ Church Cathedral with the Reverend Carol Wade presiding, on Tuesday, March 4, 2025 at 2:00 pm. Visitation will be at the church on Monday, March 3, 2025, from 5:00 pm to 8:00 pm. The family will observe a private inurnment following the service at the Lexington Cemetery.

Milward-Broadway is in charge of arrangements.

This story was originally published February 27, 2025 at 4:17 PM.