Emma Dunham Kelley-Hawkins (November 11, 1863 – October 22, 1938) was an American writer, and author of the novel Four Girls At Cottage City (1895). An earlier novel, Megda (1891), was published under her maiden name of Emma Dunham Kelley and the pseudonym "Forget-me-not." Her father was Isaac Kelley, a sailor; her mother was Gabriella A. (Chase), and she had an older sister and younger half-brother. Kelley-Hawkins married Benjamin A. Hawkins, a civil engineer, in 1982 and had two daughters. Kelley-Hawkins and her work, which focused on themes of religion and gender, fell into obscurity before her death in 1938 as well as many years following. She later rose to prominence following the rediscovery of her works, with many focused on her racial identity. Biography On November 11, 1863, in Dennis, Massachusetts, Emma Dunham Kelley-Hawkins was born the youngest of two children to Isaac Kelley, a sailor, and Gabriella A. (Chase) Kelley. On April 4, 1863, her father alongside her uncles, Johial Chase and Captain Hersey Crowell, were declared dead after disappearing off the coast of Rhode Island. Kelley-Hawkins and her older sister, Alice, were then left under the parentage of their widowed mother. She and her family remained in Dennis until at least the year 1865, before departing for New Bedford, where they would stay with her aunt, Emily (Chase) Bryant. During this time, her mother remarried, giving birth to her younger half-brother. The family relocated once more in 1868, to Lonsdale, Rhode Island. Kelly-Hawkins, alongside her brother, attended school while her older sister and her mother, now widowed a second time, worked in nearby mills. In 1885, having completed her education, Kelley-Hawkins worked as a schoolteacher. While doing this, at the age of twenty-eight, she published her first novel, Megda (1891), under the pseudonym "Forget-Me-Not." Not long after, on July 14, 1892, she married a civil engineer, Benjamin Arnon Hawkins. In the years 1894 and 1897, they had two daughters, Gala and Megda. Between this time, in 1895, Kelley-Hawkins published her second and final novel, Four Girls at Cottage City. Her marriage was racked with financial difficulties, her husband having invested much of their income on unsuccessful inventions. Their home was lost to foreclosure, and they underwent frequent moves, renting various houses. Following the death of her husband on November 22, 1929, Kelley-Hawkins and her two children moved to Providence. After many struggles, she gained financial stability with