Elizabeth C. Burchard (b. Fry) (1844-1922) was born in Shamokin Dam, Pennsylvania, and died in Arcata, California. Her family moved to Freeport, Illinois, when she was ten years old, and she was one of the first graduates of Freeport High School in 1863. In 1866 she married Jesse Burchard, a farmer, hardware merchant, and later the mayor of Vermillion, South Dakota. The Burchards moved to Vermillion in 1882. In November 1886, Burchard studied Christian Science with Caroline D. Noyes, a student of Mary Baker Eddy, at the Illinois Christian Science Institute after her sisters had been healed. Burchard later became a student of Eddy herself, completing the Primary class in March 1888. The Burchards joined The First Church of Christ, Scientist, in Boston, Massachusetts, on April 6, 1895, and Elizabeth was a member of the General Association of Teachers. She was listed in the directory of The Christian Science Journal as a Christian Science practitioner in Vermillion from 1890-1896, Lawrence, California, in 1898, Freeport from 1899-1900, and in Arcata from 1901-1922. The Burchards visited Eddy at her Pleasant View home in Concord, New Hampshire, in 1898. That same year, the couple moved to California, living briefly in Santa Clara before settling in Arcata in 1900. Christian Scientists would meet in their home before a church was eventually constructed in 1906 on land owned by the Burchards. Burchard was very active in her community; she was a member of the Eastern Star lodge, the Arcata Women's Club, and the Pleasant Hill Parent Teachers' Association. She remained a devoted Christian Scientist until the end of her life.

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