Abbie Farwell Brown

Abbie Farwell Brown was an American author.

Brown was born in Boston, Massachusetts, the first of two daughters of Benjamin F. Brown, a descendant of Isaac Allerton, and Clara Neal Brown, who contributed to The Youth's Companion. Her sister Ethel became an author and illustrator under the name Ann Underhill. Her family, for ten generations, had only resided in New England, and Brown herself spent her entire life in her family's Beacon Hill home.

Brown was valedictorian of the Bowdoin School in 1886. She then attended the Girls' Latin School, where she was friends with Josephine Preston Peabody. She was the driving force behind the newly created school newspaper, The Jabberwock, named by Brown after the poem by Lewis Carroll. They wrote to Carroll for permission to use the name and Carroll wrote back, wishing them "all success to the forthcoming magazine". The school, now Boston Latin Academy, still publishes The Jabberwock. After graduating in 1891, she attended Radcliffe College, graduating in 1894.

While at Girls' Latin School, she was contributing pieces to St. Nicholas Magazine, some illustrated by her sister. Starting in 1898, under the pen name Jean Neal she wrote articles for the St. Louis Globe-Democrat. She also wrote a one-act comedy called Quits (1896) set at a women's college.

Brown was active in New England literary life. She edited the 20-volume Young Folks Library for the publisher Hall and Locke. She was a member of the Boston Authors' Club, the Boston Drama League, the American Folklore Society, the Poetry Society of America, and was president of the New England Poetry Club.

Brown died of cancer at the age of 55.