M. Augusta De Forrest Brown (1836-1926), later known as Mary A. B. Girard, was born in Albany, New York, and died in San Francisco, California. She was a medical doctor who graduated from the Woman's Medical College of Chicago in 1883. After graduation she moved to Europe and attended the Milan Conservatory, where she studied the relationship between vocal and physical health. After returning to the United States, she became interested in Christian Science and became a student of Mary Baker Eddy's, completing the Primary class (1885) and Normal class (1886). After studying with Eddy, she maintained a Christian Science healing and teaching practice in New York City, but by the summer of 1889, she had stopped practicing and left the Christian Science movement shortly after. Brown spent the rest of her life living between Illinois and California, practicing medicine and lecturing on a wide range of subjects.

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