Emma Whitcomb Babcock (née, Whitcomb; April 24, 1849 – 1926) was an American litterateur and author. ^[1] She did considerable work as a book reviewer, and contributed to various leading magazines. She was the author of Household Hints, a domestic management guide, and A Mother's Note Book, as well as other works.^[2] She was president of The Belles-Lettres club, well known in western Pennsylvania, which founded a public library.^[3][4] Babcock died in 1926.

Emma Whitcomb was born in Adams, New York, April 24, 1849.^[5] She was the daughter of Henry Holley Whitcomb and Judith Maria Mooney Whitcomb.^[6]

As a writer, Babcock contributed to journals and magazines. Also a book-reviewer, she was probably best known through her series of unsized articles which during five years appeared in the New York City "Evening Post." She was a contributor to the first number of "Babyhood" and also of the "Cosmopolitan." She published "Household Hints" (1890),^[7] and later, "A Mother's Note Book." She conducted a department in the Homemaker. Babcock werote a novel, which embodied many distinctive features of the oil country. Her husband's profession turned her attention to educational subjects, and she published many articles in the technical journals on those subjects. She was interested in home mission work and was president of a literary club which was known throughout western Pennsylvania, and which founded a public library.^[5] She died in 1926 and is buried in Adams Rural Cemetery, Adams, New York.

She became a resident of Oil City, in which town her husband, Charles Almanzo Babcock, was superintendent of schools. Their son, Bertrand Whitcomb Babcock, married the writer, Winnifred Eaton.^[9] Emma Whitcomb Babcock died in 1926.^[10]