Edward C. Towne (1834-1911) was born in Goshen, Massachusetts, and died in Brooklyn, New York. He graduated from Yale University in 1856 and from Yale Theological Seminary in 1860. He married Henrietta Page in Medford, Massachusetts, in 1864; the marriage was dissolved in 1872. Towne served as a Unitarian clergyman at various churches in Massachusetts and England. He was also engaged in the journalism business and served as Associate Editor of the Chicago Tribune (1858-1869), Editor of The Examiner (1870-1871), and Associate Editor of the Chicago Evening Journal (1869-1872). In 1884 he married Ann E. Towne (b. Hathaway) of Plymouth, Massachusetts. In the mid-1880s Towne worked for John Wilson and Son, a Cambridge, Massachusetts, printing firm that was responsible for printing the works of Mary Baker Eddy from 1881 until about 1911. In 1888 he went to New York, where he worked on the Encyclopaedia Britannica as a contributor, adviser, and index-maker. Towne was involved with the editorial corps at the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition and interacted with Edward A. Kimball, who Eddy had put in charge of managing the Christian Science exhibit.

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