Elizabeth Craig Eggleston was born in Saint Paul, Minnesota, Minnesota, December 15, 1858.
She was a daughter of Edward Eggleston, the novelist.
Her mother, Elizabeth, was of English parentage and of a family with talent for graphic art.
Seelye early showed the "book hunger" that characterized members of her family.
In 1866, the family removed to Evanston, Illinois, where her father had built one of the earliest kindergartens in America where his children might "be trained".

After they moved to Brooklyn, New York, in 1870, Seelye attended Packer Collegiate Institute, but with her parents dissatisfied, she and her sister were soon taught at home by private teachers.
She also was the only child to attend adult classes in French and German at the Brooklyn Mercantile Library.

Her love of reading was illustrated in her writing.
Her story "“The A.O.I.B.R." appeared in Harper's Bazaar in 1889 with an illustration of a child reading.
The Rockwell Centre for American Visual Studies cites this as a surprisingly early illustration of a girl reading.
The subject of girls reading in the illustration by Rosina Emmet Sherwood is thought rare (like the  ones in Louisa Allcott's Little Women).
Elizabeth Craig Eggleston was born in Saint Paul, Minnesota, Minnesota, December 15, 1858. She was a daughter of Edward Eggleston, the novelist. Her mother, Elizabeth, was of English parentage and of a family with talent for graphic art. Seelye early showed the "book hunger" that characterized members of her family. In 1866, the family removed to Evanston, Illinois, where her father had built one of the earliest kindergartens in America where his children might "be trained". 
After they moved to Brooklyn, New York, in 1870, Seelye attended Packer Collegiate Institute, but with her parents dissatisfied, she and her sister were soon taught at home by private teachers. She also was the only child to attend adult classes in French and German at the Brooklyn Mercantile Library.
Her love of reading was illustrated in her writing. Her story "“The A.O.I.B.R." appeared in Harper's Bazaar in 1889 with an illustration of a child reading. The Rockwell Centre for American Visual Studies cites this as a surprisingly early illustration of a girl reading. The subject of girls reading in the illustration by Rosina Emmet Sherwood is thought rare (like the  ones in Louisa Allcott's Little Women).
Elizabeth Eggleston Seelye