Emily Jordan Folger

Emily Jordan Folger
Folger in her Vassar robes, by Frank O. Salisbury, 1927
Born	Emily Clara Jordan (1858-05-15)15 May 1858 Ironton, Ohio
Died	21 February 1936(1936-02-21) (aged 77) Glen Cove, Long Island
Education	Miss Ranney's School Vassar College
Known for	Folger Shakespeare Library
Spouse(s)	Henry Clay Folger (1885–1930; his death)
Parent(s)	Edward W. Jordan Augusta Woodbury Ricker

Emily Jordan Folger, born Emily Clara Jordan (May 15, 1858–February 21, 1936), was the wife of Henry Clay Folger and the co-founder of the Folger Shakespeare Library. During her husband's lifetime, she assisted him in building the world's largest collection of Shakespeare materials. After his death in 1930, she funded the completion of the Folger Shakespeare Library to house the collection, remaining involved with its administration until her death in 1936.

Emily Jordan was born in Ironton, Ohio to Edward W. Jordan and his wife, Augusta Woodbury Ricker. She was the third of their three daughters, preceded by Mary Augusta and Elizabeth. Edward Jordan served as Solicitor of the Treasury Department under Presidents Abraham Lincoln and Andrew Johnson, and her family lived in Washington, D.C., for that part of her childhood. Emily received her early education at Miss Ranney's School in Elizabeth, New Jersey, which prepared women for teaching or higher education. There, Emily was instructed in English language and literature, modern languages, mathematics, philosophy, and the natural sciences.

In 1875, she followed both of her sisters to Vassar College, where she was elected president of the 36-member class of 1879. At Vassar, Emily was accomplished in English composition and astronomy. She was educated in the latter subject by astronomer and Vassar professor Maria Mitchell, who was also a distant relative of her future husband, Henry Clay Folger, via their common ancestor, Peter Foulger. After graduating from Vassar in 1879, she worked in Brooklyn for six years as an instructor in the college-prep section of a private girls' school, Miss Hotchkiss's Nassau Institute.

Emily was introduced to Henry Clay Folger as early as 1880, at a meeting of the Irving Literary Circle of Brooklyn by Lillie Pratt, sister of Charles Pratt, with whom Folger attended Amherst College. At an 1882 club picnic, the Pratts prompted toasts from both Emily and Henry, who quoted Othello and As You Like It, respectively. Folger was a graduate of Columbia Law School, and a young oil-company executive, who later became the president and then the chairman of Standard Oil of New York. Little else is known about their courtship; on October 6, 1885, Emily married Henry at Westminster Presbyterian Church in Elizabeth, New Jersey, where Emily had spent her teenage years. After the wedding, the Folgers moved into a Brooklyn home with Folger's parents. For many years, they lived in rented homes in Brooklyn, moving to Bedford-Stuyvesant in 1895, and to 24 Brevoort Place in 1910. They ultimately purchased an estate in Glen Cove, Long Island, in 1929.