“Her wealth is variously estimated from $2,000,000 to $5,000,000. Nearer than this I cannot estimate it,” said Seth Abbott, father of the deceased Emma Abbott, the “People’s Prima Donna.” He was quoted in a New York Times Jan. 5, 1891 article, “Emma Abbott’s Last Hours,” which was wired from Salt Lake City, Utah, by an uncredited writer who gave a eyewitness account of the singer’s last moments.
Abbott was one of the most successful of the 19th-century American operatic singers who formed and toured with their own English-language opera companies. The Abbott English Opera Company, formed in 1878, was touring at about the time Wild West lawman Wyatt Earp moved to Tombstone, Arizona.
