Safford Family.

The Sunderland and Safford families have been an influential presence in Michigan history. The Safford family came to Michigan from the East Coast in the first half of the nineteenth century, and have deep roots in the Plymouth/Canton Township area. Several Safford cousins enlisted in the Michigan 24th Infantry during the Civil War; the collection includes the letters of Winfield Scott Safford to his brother Robert Crawford Safford. (Winfield Scott Safford was killed in action at Gettysburg, July 1st, 1863.) The Sunderlands, meanwhile, first came to Ann Arbor in 1878, as a result of the pastorate of prominent Unitarian Minister Jabez T. Sunderland (1846-1936). (Sunderland was pastor of the First Unitarian Church in Ann Arbor from 1878 to 1898.) During that period, the Sunderland's eldest daughter Gertrude (1873-1967) met Robert Crawford Safford's son, Homer Erwin Safford (1869-1933). Homer Safford and Gertrude Sunderland married in 1898.

This collection is comprised primarily of the papers of Homer E. and Gertrude S. Safford, their daughters Mildred H. Safford (1901-) and Helen Safford Toohy (1899-1997), and of Homer Safford's sister, Ada Murray Safford (1877-1951). Many of the Saffords and Sunderlands (and Sunderland Saffords) have connections to the University of Michigan: Gertrude Sunderland Safford received an AB in 1895, Homer E. Safford a PhB in 1892 and an MD in 1896, and Homer Safford's sister, Ada Murray Safford, attended UM from 1896 to 1900. Homer E. and Gertrude S. Safford's daughters Mildred H. Safford and Helen Safford (later Toohy) both received their AB degrees in 1923. Also, Truman Sunderland Safford attended UM with his sisters Mildred and Helen during 1920-1921, before moving on to Antioch College with Mildred. Finally, Clifford M. Toohy (Helen Safford Toohy's husband) attended Michigan for an AB in 1917 and for his law degree in 1920. Moreover, Gertrude's mother, Eliza Jane Read Sunderland (1839-1910), and siblings, Edson Sunderland (1874-1959) and Florence Sunderland (?-1925), received degrees from the University.

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