Emerson was born the second of three children to college sweethearts Brian, a pediatrician, and Linda Eckhart, a music teacher. While the Eckharts were a fairly typical middle class family, her parents wanted nothing but the best for their children, two girls and lastly a boy, and worked hard to keep the family comfortable and happy. Each of the kids were encouraged to find interest in their own activities and to experience as much as they could. Much like her older sister, Julia, at a young age, Emerson found herself quietly craving the spotlight. Her parents took notice as she excelled in dance classes, managing to juggle tap, jazz and hip hop between school work, cheer and show choir, never realizing the doors that would open for their daughter later in life.
Things changed drastically for the tight knit family before Emerson finished high school, though. Julia had moved out of the house, after saving money all through her own high school years, and had moved to Los Angeles in hopes of making her dreams of being an actress come true. Her parents wished she had gone to college, and though somewhat disapproving, they fervently supported her. That ended up being the good news for the family. For a long time, Linda had put off routine exams, physicals and check ups. There was too much going on, she had reasoned, too many things to take care of for the family, and while she was tired, a few aches and pains, she wrote it off as a busy schedule and a need to take more vitamins. By the time a doctor told her she had breast cancer, the diseased cells had already metastasized, infecting other cells in her body. She immediately began treatment, had a tumor removed as well as numerous lymphnodes, all that showed positive for cancerous cells. Radiation therapy made her ill in a way that made getting out of bed nearly impossible, and with a bleak prognosis, Linda made a hard decision. She would rather enjoy the time she had left with her family than suffer through chemotherapy. Julia came home, and while the family spent a great deal of time together, Linda passed away the summer before Emerson began her senior year in high school.
With Julia back in California, more determined than ever to make it as an actress, to live life to its fullest knowing how short it could truly be, Emerson became the woman of the house. They were all devastated at the loss, but her father took it the hardest, and while he struggled to keep it together and continue to provide for his family, Emerson did all she could to help out at home. Often she made dinner and helped her younger brother, Michael, with his homework between completing her own and maintaining her previously busy schedule. For a while, they made it work, living at home, long enough for Emerson to finish her senior year with her friends and the familiarity of home. But by the time the first anniversary of her mother's passing was approaching, it was obvious the family needed a fresh start, and when her father decided to move the family to California to join Julia, Emerson resolved not to attend Indiana University, where she had been planning to study, and instead enrolled as a freshman at University of Southern California to study kinesiology.
But college was expensive and Emerson hated to put an additional strain on her father. To help a bit financially, Emerson added a job at a high end restaurant as a waitress to her schedule, serving local celebrities and big names in evenings after class. But it wasn't until her friends from school pushed her into an audition for the competition show So You Think You Can Dance that Emerson considered the entertainment industry a place to turn. Though she didn't make the final top 20, the door to new opportunities was already open. While before she never thought a dance career was something of a real possibility, the occasional weekend spent on the set of a music video or movie set earned her a better paycheck than her waitress job.
As her four years at university drew to an end, Emerson began applying to graduate schools, sure she would be continuing her education. But a friend of a friend had introduced her to a choreographer who had a hand in casting dancers for a few public performances and thought she had exactly the look they needed. It didn't take long for her to accept the small offers that began to come her way, deferring studies for a year with the idea that if something more steady didn't come of the opportunity by then, she would return to school. As far as Emerson is concerned, that was never meant to be. In the years since Emerson has continued to book steady work, becoming increasingly more well known.
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