Herbert O. Dobbs (1864-1893) was born in Winona, Minnesota, and died in O'Neill, Nebraska. He married Ida M. Dobbs (b. Dickenson) in Winona in 1887, and thereafter they resided in Lansing, Iowa, where Dobbs was an accountant for the Lansing Lumber Company. In 1891, seeking improvement in his health, he moved to Colorado for two years before going to O'Neill to live with his brother. In 1886, Dobbs wrote to Mary Baker Eddy to order a copy of Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures and to express his interest in studying with her, although there is no record his having done so. His step-mother, Mary E. Dobbs, and his half-brothers Percy M. Dobbs and Arthur E. Dobbs were members of The First Church of Christ, Scientist, in Boston, Massachusetts, and Mary and Percy were also listed as practitioners in The Christian Science Journal in the early 1900s.

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