Ella J. C. Hurd was born Ella Jayne Conklin in Huntington, New York in 1843 to the Conklin family of colonial New England. She married Arthur T. Hurd in 1890. Ella was interested in natural history and studied ferns. In 1911, Ella donated the David Conklin Farmhouse to the Huntington Historical Society in Long Island, New York. She lived in Florida before her death in April 1917 and was buried in Huntington Rural Cemetary.