[1] Elizabeth attended Ohio Wesleyan Female College and graduated in 1855 with the degree of Mistress of English Literature.
Elizabeth married James W. Somers, a lawyer, in early 1863 and left a teaching position in Centerville to move to Washington, D.C.[1] Somers continued her career teaching mathematics at a day school and bible classes at the Metropolitan Methodist Church.
In 1875, Somers opened the Mount Vernon Seminary with a rigorous curriculum for girls as well as young women preparing for college.
Elizabeth Somers' school was named Mount Vernon Seminary in honor of her late brother, Thomas Mears Eddy, a respected Methodist minister, who helped found the Mount Vernon Place Methodist Church in Baltimore, Maryland, in 1872.
Mount Vernon College for Women relocated a couple of times thereafter until it merged with The George Washington University in 1999.