Reverend Hanford Abram Edson (1837-1920) and his wife Helen had at least four children: Hanford Wisner (July 4, 1871-1923), Elmer Rockwood (b. November 1872), Helen M. (b. October 6, 1879, m. Charles Taft Ennis), and Caroline M. (b. January 1881). The Edson family lived in Indianapolis, Indiana.
Hanford Wisner Edson graduated from Williams College in Williamstown, Massachusetts, in 1890 and taught mathematics at Robert College, a private boarding school in Constantinople (now Istanbul), Turkey, until the mid-1890s, when he returned to Williams College as an instructor of elocution and rhetoric. After an unspecified incident in February 1896, he was admitted to the state asylum in Northampton, Massachusetts, but he later became a minister and book salesman.
Elmer Rockwood Edson attended the Phillips Exeter Academy until 1890 and attended Williams College between 1890 and 1891. He became a surgeon after graduating from the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine in 1899 and worked in Indianapolis, Indiana; Biloxi, Mississippi; Seattle, Washington; and Wheatland Township, New York, where he lived with his father, brother, and sister Caroline in 1920. Both Edson brothers were members of the Delta Upsilon fraternity while at Williams College.
From the guide to the Edson family papers, 1886-1894, (William L. Clements Library, University of Michigan)
