Her story, like so many who live here, is something of a happy accident. Here to visit friends, the city took hold, and Emma began teaching art classes, a year later submitting her seal to a design competition sponsored by the First Legislature for the State of Idaho. A unanimous vote declared her design the winner, and Edwards received $50, as reported by The Idaho Statesman, from Governor N.B. Willey. 

For a few years, Edwards taught in a series of elementary schools throughout the state, including Bruneau, Pine, and Atlanta. She also opened drawing and painting at Boise Kindergarten, establishing her reputation as, according to The Idaho Statesman, “a well-known artist.” Edwards continued to teach, selling paintings of Thunder Mountain scenery and more. 

“The design of the Great Seal speaks for her artistic qualifications,” wrote The Idaho Statesman. Her qualifications, it turned out, were many—Idaho Country Free Press lists publication of her stories in the Midland Monthly in 1895, also accompanied by her illustrations. 

“It is an Idaho story full of local color, and deals with scenes in the Long Valley, the Seven Devils, and other mining camps in Boise and Washington counties. The hero was a member of the first session of the state legislature,” they wrote. In 1903, Edwards married James G. Green of Lowman. While the pair had no children, she helped raise her nephews, and died in Idaho in 1942.

Though the Idaho State Seal was slightly modified in later versions, including the one currently in use, her legacy lives on in the state flag and the original oil paintings, now housed at the Idaho State Historical Society. 

Broken down into its component parts, the Idaho seal is framed by a red and gold band, which identifies it as the Great Seal of the State of Idaho, a sentiment echoed below when it is replicated on the flag, the inverted arch of a red ribbon lined in gold, curling upward in decorative spirals at each end. 

Inside, a banner proclaims “Esto Perpetua,” the state motto, meaning let it be perpetual, or it is forever. Then, a rising sun, the head of an elk, upon a bushel of wheat, a shield bearing a river, a pinetree and, in later years, a plow. On one side, a woman dresses in white and holding a scale, and on the other, a miner, together representing equality, liberty, and justice, a cornucopia of produce at their feet. 

This seal adorns the flag, set against a blue field that bears the words “State of Idaho” on a red and gold band, gold fringe around the edges. Even the official proportions are unique at 26:33, though reproductions diverge and, during most of the 1920s, there was only one known Idaho flag in existence, which remained in possession of Governor C.C. Moore, even as he traveled. 

And from forests to farmland and pandemic to protest, let it be known that Idaho—and the people that live here—have, as our motto suggests, endured. In the intricacies of light refracted from a garnet, the brushstrokes of an artist, and the carefully chosen symbols stitched into our seal and then our flag, we begin to tell the story of Idaho, a state shaped not by its natural beauty, but by the resilience, creativity, and quiet determination of its people. From humble beginnings emerges the kind of greatness that keeps us coming back—bold, steadfast, and everlasting.