Emma L. Farlow (c. 1864-1893) was born in Orange Township, Illinois, and died in Topeka, Kansas. By 1880 the Farlow family had moved to Knoxville, Illinois, and by 1885 to Beatrice, Nebraska, where Emma worked as a teacher. Emma was one of eight siblings, all of whom composed the Farlow Family Band which toured and performed widely in the Midwestern United States in the mid-1880s. Emma played the baritone horn. In 1885 the Farlow family was introduced to Christian Science, and in March 1886, Emma, along with her siblings Alfred, William, and Sarah, studied Christian Science with Janet T. Colman, a student of Mary Baker Eddy's. The Farlows moved to Topeka in 1888, where several of them became active in establishing Christian Science, including the founding of the Kansas Christian Science Institute, where Emma took a class from her brother Alfred in October 1888. Together Emma, Alfred, William, and Sarah went on to take the Primary course with Eddy in 1889, and all four subsequently joined both the Christian Scientist Association and the National Christian Scientist Association.

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