The research on the life of Emma Curtis Hopkins begins with the 1850 Pomfret, Windham, CT census. We find the listing for Rufus D. Curtis with his wife Lydia and one child Josephine E, 1 year old. This census was taken in November 1850, so it is reasonable to assume that Josephine was born in September 1849. Next in the 1860 Killingly, Windham, CT census we find Rufus and Lydia with 6 children. "Emma J" age 10 being the oldest, and we can assume that once called Josephine she had now become known as Emma.
In 1880 we find Emma on the Nantucket, MA census married to George I Hopkins and a 5 year old son John C., and her sister Estella M Curtis.
She matriculated in Mrs. Eddy's Primary Class of December 1883, never going onto the advanced classes, but becoming editor of the Christian Science Journal in September 1884.
By 1886 she was a practitioner in Chicago, but excommunicated by Mrs. Eddy in 1887 & again in 1888 along with Julius Dresser ". . . for being Mind-quacks who were spreading abroad patchwork books, false compendiums of my system crediting some ignoramus or infidel with teaching they have stolen from me. The unweaned suckling whines while spitting out the breast-milk which sustained him . . . "
By then Emma had started her own Christian Science Theological Seminary. You have to remember that at that time all the teachings that later became New Thought were called Christian Science. It wasn't until Mrs. Baker Eddy claimed the term for her own that everybody else had to find new names, including the Fillmores who called their work UNITY.
The list of her pupils sounds like a Who's Who of New Thought, for among them were:
Frances Lord Annie Rix Militz Malinda Cramer Harriet Rix Mrs. Bingham Helen Wilmans Charles Fillmore Myrtle Fillmore Charles A. Barton Josephine Barton Dr. H. Emilie Cady Ella Wheeler Elizabeth Towne Ernest Holmes These were among the many across the country who attended her classes. Sometimes she enrolled as many as a 1000 students, each of whom paid $50 for a 2 week course of 12 lessons.
She declares "There is one indestructible substance pervading all things from the remotest star to the nearest dust particle . . . It can only be the cognized by the mind . . . and only the understanding power of the mind can make it useful. He who by any manner . . . handles this substance and realizes its nature as his nature soon finds himself experiencing vital renewal throughout body and mind."
Click here for a special section on Emma Curtis Hopkins Twelve Powers of the Soul. Later transformed into Twelve Powers of Man by Charles Fillmore
Click here for our "Pulse" articles on Emma.
Click here for THE TEACHINGS OF EMMA CURTIS HOPKINS by Marge Flotron
Geneaology Research done by the staff of ConnectingCousins.com