Isabella Macdonald (1841-1930) was born in Rochester, New York, in a well-educated and religious family. The nickname "Pansy" was given to her from her father, because of picking pansies in her childhood. She attended school at Seneca Collegiate Institute at Ovid, New York, and then at Young Ladies Institute, Auburn, New York. In 1866, she married Gustavus Rosenberg Alden, a Presbyterian minister. She communicated the Gospel through writing Sunday-school lessons, magazine articles, and hundreds of stories in her lifetime.