Emily Simmons  was born May 22, 1849 in Lobo Twp., Middlesex Co., Ontario, Canada, daughter of Erastus Simmons and Elizabeth Millard. She accompanied her parents and siblings to DeKalb Co., Missouri, in 1867. In that year, the family farmed and made one crop, then moved to a farm near Sweet Springs in Saline County.

Although Emily never married and had no children of her own, she was surrogate mother to many of her nieces and nephews who held her in high regard. Charlie Simmons, her brother Jonathan's boy, might have disagreed. She kept him in short pants long past the age most boys graduated to the longer ones.

At a venerable 94 years of age, Emily died from stomach cancer on September 6, 1943, and was buried in Deepwater Cemetery, Henry Co., Missouri, two days later.

1851 Census, Canada
1861 Census, Canada
1870 Census, Co., Missouri, p.
1880 Census, Co., Missouri, p.
1900 Census, Co., Missouri, e. d. , sheet , p.
1910 Census
1920 Census
1930 Census
Missouri State Board of Health, Bureau of Vital Statistics, Certificate of Death