Laura Elizabeth Howe Richards (February 27, 1850 - January 14, 1943) was an American writer. She wrote more than 90 books including biographies, poetry, and several for children. One well-known children's poem is her literary nonsense verse "Eletelephony". Laura Elizabeth Howe was born in Boston, Massachusetts. Her father was Dr. Samuel Gridley Howe, an abolitionist and the founder of the Perkins Institution and Massachusetts School for the Blind. She was named after his famous deaf-blind pupil Laura Bridgman. Her mother Julia Ward Howe wrote the words to "The Battle Hymn of the Republic". In 1917 Laura won a Pulitzer Prize for Julia Ward Howe, 1819-1910, a biography, which she co-authored with her sisters, Maud Howe Elliott and Florence Hall.