Edna Howland was born Sadie Edna Howland on September 22, 1886, to Benjamin L. Howland and Mary (Murray) Howland, in Somerset, Massachusetts. Her father, Benjamin L. Howland, served in the American Civil War. He spent eight months as a prisoner of war after the Second Battle of the Weldon Railroad. The Howland family moved to Providence, Rhode Island between 1891 and 1896. Howland's first documented piano solo was at a church social given by the Junior Society of the Stewart Street Baptist Church.