Edmund Clarence Stedman

Edmund Clarence Stedman (October 8, 1833 – January 18, 1908) was an American poet, critic, essayist, banker, and scientist.

Edmund Clarence Stedman was born in Hartford, Connecticut, on October 8, 1833; his father, Major Edmund Burke Stedman died of tuberculosis two years later in December 1835. By the following spring, his mother Elizabeth Clementine Stedman moved the boy and his younger brother to Plainfield, New Jersey, to live with her wealthy father, David Low Dodge.

Dodge, a Calvinist and pacifist, was strict, did not want to use his finances to support his grandchildren, and often physically punished the boys for bad behavior. Mrs. Stedman sold poems and stories to magazines including Graham's Magazine, Sartain's Magazine, The Knickerbocker, and Godey's Lady's Book for income. Eventually, the children were taken in by their paternal grandfather, Griffin Stedman, and his brother James in Norwich, Connecticut.