Eleanor Ruth Gump Colburn  was born in Dayton, Ohio. Colburn studied art as pupil of the American artists William Merritt Chase and Frank Duveneck. She attended the Art Institute of Chicago where she eventually began teaching art. In 1924, she and her daughter Ruth Eaton Peabody moved to Laguna Beach, California.

Like many artists during the Great Depression, Colburn became a painter under the WPA, producing a mural for the Lagnua school. Colburn also traveled around the Southwest to the the Navajo Reservation in Arizona, and other areas of Colorado, New Mexico, and Arizona. Colburn was best known for her landscapes but she also produced figurative works, often focusing on depictions of mothers and children.

Colburn was a member of the Laguna Beach Art Association, and the Painters and Sculptors Club of Los Angeles. Her work was exhibited at the Cincinnati Art Museum, Fine Arts Gallery of San Diego and the John Herron Institute in Indianapolis.  Colburn has produced a substantial body of work and is well-known as a substantial California artist.