Hanford-Munn family papers

Franklin Hanford was born in Chili, New York on November 8, 1844, the oldest child of William Haynes Hanford, Jr. (1819-1903) and Abbey Lewis (Pixley) Hanford (1822-1885). After attending Rochester Free Academy he applied to the United States Naval Academy in November, 1862. After he had passed the entrance examinations, he discovered that, because of a recent rule change, he was too old to be admitted. Dismayed, he went to his Congressional representative, Alfred Ely, who arranged an interview with Abraham Lincoln. Lincoln, after hearing Ely's plea in Hanford's behalf, wrote a note to the Secretary of the Navy, Gideon Welles, directing that Hanford be reinstated. Hanford graduated in 1866, and thereafter he rose steadily through the ranks of ensign, 1868; master, 1869; lieutenant 1870; lieutenant-commander, 1885; commander, 1894; and captain, 1901. He retired in 1903, after having reached the rank of rear admiral in that year.

During his 40-year career, Hanford received many important assignments. He circumnavigated the globe in 1881-4 aboard the flagship Pensacola, taking observations for the determination of the variations of the compass. During the revolutions in Ecuador and Nicaragua, 1895-7, he commanded the U.S.S. Alert and cruised in the waters of those countries in order to protect American interests there. After the Spanish-American War, Hanford was appointed commander of the United States Naval Station at Cavite, Philippine Islands. While there he directed the salvage operation on Spanish warships that had been sunk by Admiral Dewey during the war.

Upon his retirement in 1903, Hanford returned to Scottsville to manage a farm that he had purchased some years previously. In 1912, he suffered a stroke that paralyzed his right side and left him almost a complete invalid. He continued to occupy himself with collecting and studying books on naval and local New York history, and he wrote several pamphlets on these subjects. He also attempted to trace his Hanford and Pixley forbears and he and a cousin, Edward Evans Pixley, wrote and published William Pixley and Some of His Descendants in 1900. Admiral Hanford went blind in 1925, three years before his death at Scottsville, New York, on February 8, 1928. For additional information, see the Franklin Hanford Papers.

Franklin Hanford married Sara Adelia Crosby ("Sadie") on November 6, 1878. She was the daughter of Owen Dexter Crosby and Annis M. (Williams) Crosby. She was born on September 3, 1851. After the death of her father, her mother married Theodore Romeyn Sibley. The Hanfords had three surviving children, the oldest of whom, Mary Crosby Hanford (1880-1), died of diphtheria at the age of fourteen months. In her later years, Mrs. Sara Hanford suffered from a nervous complaint and went to Dansville for treatment in 1912. She died of pneumonia on November 10, 1915.

John Munn Hanford, the only son of Franklin and Sara (Crosby) Hanford, was born on February 2, 1882, at Scottsville, New York. He graduated from Scottsville Union High School in June, 1899, and from St. John's Military School at Manlius, New York, in 1901. He next attended Williams College in Massachusetts, receiving his degree in 1905. He began the study of medicine at the University and Bellevue Medical College, New-York City, in October, 1905. During the summer of 1907, he and his cousin William Hanford Curtiss went to Europe. They toured England, France, and Italy, but spent most of their time in Germany. John Hanford received his M.D. degree from Bellevue in 1909. He was an intern at the Presbyterian Hospital, New York City, from January 1, 1910 to January 1, 1912. Next he worked at the Hospital of the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research for five months and then at the Sloane Maternity and Dispensary. He opened private practice in New York City on October 1, 1912, but he continued to act as a medical consultant in surgery for the Presbyterian Hospital throughout his career. He retired from private practice on May 1, 1964 and died in June, 1973 at the age of 91.

Dr. Hanford married Gwendolen Conant Smith of New York City on September 3, 1913. She was born on October 16, 1889 and was the daughter of Amos Woodruff Smith and Carrie (Conant) Smith (d. Dec. 23, 1922). Mrs. Carrie (Conant) Smith's father was A. Jasper Conant, a portrait painter of some note. John and Gwendolen Hanford had four children: Helen Conant, born June 16, 1914; Sara Crosby, born November 17, 1915, Nancy Haines, born April 25, 1919; and John Munn Jr., born December 29, 1922. Helen Hanford married W. Benedict Johnson on June 24, 1937, and had two sons, Richard Hanford (b. 1940) and David (b. 1948). Richard H. Johnnon married Louise Murphy in 1963 and had two sons, Mark and Timothy. David Johnson married Roberta Copernoll in 1973. Sara Crosby Hanford married Charles F. Stewart on June 9, 1939. The Stewarts had three children: Mary ("Molly"), Andrew, and Nancy. Molly married Paul Laird and had one daughter, Rachel Hanford Laird (b. 1965). In 1956 Sara (Hanford) Stewart developed multiple sclerosis. She was divorced from her husband in June, 1958, and died on December 2 of that year. Nancy H. Hanford married Edward Scott on June 30, 1939. The couple had one son, Edward ("Ted") and a daughter, Gwendolen Conant ("Wendy"). Ted Scott served in Viet Nam and then married and had a son, James (b. 1973). Wendy Scott (b. 1942) married Alan Buck in 1959 and had two children, Lisa (b. 1960) and Alan Scott (b. 1962). Nancy H. (Hanford) Scott died suddenly on November 20. 1947. John Munn Hanford Jr. served as an ensign in World War II. After the war he became a schoolteacher and married Marilyn Todd Fisher on June 23, 1951. The couple had three children: John Munn III (b. 1952), Todd (b. 1954), and Charles Franklin (b. 1960). Gwendolen (Smith) Hanford died on January 23, 1967.

Ruth Crosby Hanford, the younger sister of John Munn Hanford, M.D., was born on March 23, 1887 at Cold Spring, New York. She graduated from Scottsville Union High School in 1903 and from St. Margaret's School, Buffalo, in 1905. She entered Wellesley College as a freshman in September, 1905. In her senior year she was elected to serve as her class's representative and president. After her graduation from Wellesley in June, 1909, Ruth became a teacher at St. Agnes School in Albany, New York, for two years. In the summer of 1911, the worsening health of her parents obliged her to move back to Scottsville to take care of them, which she did for the next seventeen years. She still, however, continued to maintain various interests. She carried on a voluminous correspondence with her brother, her Hanford and Dunn cousins, and Wellesley classmates. She was a leader of the local group of Campfire Girls in 1915. In the fall and winter of 1919-20 she was selected to be a visiting counselor for Wellesley College. She made a tour of selected cities in the western United States, speaking about the growth of the college and staying with Wellesley alumni. After her father's death in 1928, Ruth went back to school and received a master's degree from the University of Wisconsin at Madison in 1929. She worked as a school guidance counselor in Cincinnati, Ohio in 1929-30, in New York City in 1930-31 and in Milwaukee, Wisconsin in 1931-2.

On August 31, 1932, Ruth married her second cousin, James Buell Munn. His father, John Pixley Munn (1846-1931), was a first cousin of Franklin-Hanford, their mothers being sisters. Throughout their lives, the two cousins had remained close. While going to school, Franklin Hanford boarded at the home of his cousin, Paradise Hill in Gates, New York. In 1861, the two boys gave each other diaries for Christmas, which they both kept during the following year. Franklin Hanford named his son for his cousin, and young John Hanford stayed at the home of John Pixley Munn for a short period of time while he was attending medical school in New York City. John Pixley Munn had graduated from the University of Rochester in 1870 and had then entered Bellevue Hospital Medical College in New York City in 1872. He received his M.D. degree in 1876. He entered private practice and also became medical examiner for the United States Life Insurance Company in 1877. Eventually he was named a director of the company and was elected president in 1902. He also served as trustee of the University of Rochester from 1886 until his death in 1931. He was Chairman of the Board of Trustees from 1916 to 1931.

On April 21, 1881, John Pixley Munn married Martha Buell Plum (1856-1926). Her uncle was James Buell, who was born at Glenn's Falls, New York, on March 23, 1820. He became a well-known financier and his testimony before Congress in 1874 was instrumental in the framing of the Sherman Bill of 1875. In that same year he helped to found the American Bankers' Association and was appointed president of the United States Life Insurance Company of New York. He was also president of the Importers and Traders' National Bank of New York for many years. He died on April 4, 1881, shortly after his retirement from office. Of all his nieces, Martha Buell (Plum) Munn seemed to be his favorite. He sent her to Europe in 1877-8 and he named her in his will, along with his second wife, Electa (Kellogg) Buell. His sister, Martha (Buell) Plum (1822-1873) had run, a girl's school in Georgia before her marriage to Elias Plum. Their daughter, Mrs. John P. Munn, was also interested in women's education. She served as president of the Women's Legal Education Society, which founded a series of law lectures to women at the Washington Square Branch of New York University in 1896. Besides their son James, the Munns also had a daughter, Aristine Pixley, born on May 29, 1887. She also became a doctor and was named Dean of Women at Washington Square College. She married Charles Recht and had one son, John Munn Recht. For more information and items dealing with John Pixley Munn and his family, see the Munn-Pixley Papers.

James Buell Munn was born on September 24, 1890. He received an A.B. summa cum laude from Harvard University in 1912. He was named Charles Eliot Norton Fellow for 1912-3, and spent the year at the American School of Classical Studies in Athens. He returned to Harvard in 1913 as a graduate student and in 1917 he received a Ph.D. in Comparative Literature. During World War I he enlisted as a Second Lieutenant of Infantry and rose to the rank of Major. He was in France from July, 1918, to August, 1919, serving as assistant to the Chief of Staff at the Paris Headquarters during much of this time. Upon returning to the United States, he declined a post at Harvard, choosing instead a post in the English Department at Washington Square Branch of New York University so that he could live at home to look after his aging parents. He became a full professor in 1926, and from 1925-8 he served as assistant dean of Washington Square College. Even then he was famous for his concern for his students. If a promising graduate or undergraduate student was unable to continue his education because of lack of funds, Munn would privately pay the fees of that student. In 1963, some of the grateful recipients of Munn's generosity created the James Buell Munn Scholarship Fund in his honor. While at Washington Square College, Munn also befriended Thomas Wolfe. He read the manuscript version of Wolfe's Look Homeward Angel in 1928 and recommended that it be published without any changes.

After his father's death in 1931, Munn resigned from his position at Washington Square College and returned to teach at Harvard. He bought a house in Cambridge, 58 Garden St., in the spring of 1932. He had it thoroughly remodeled and renovated prior to his marriage and his removal to Cambridge in the fall of that year. While at Harvard, Munn taught courses on Robert Browning, his specialty, and the English Bible. He also taught an introductory survey course of English literature and gave tutorial classes, occasionally serving as Head Tutor. He was Chairman of the Department of English from 1934 to 1946. He was also a member of the Administrative Board of Harvard College during his entire Harvard career, from 1932 until his retirement in 1957. He continued to be generous and hospitable. He gave copies of his house keys to hundreds of his students so that they could use his library and study in a quiet atmosphere. He collected rare books and made anonymous donations to the Houghton Library at Harvard. He was given an honorary Litt.D. from New York University. Munn's health declined in later years, he was confined to his bed with back problems and he developed arteriosclerosis. He died on February 13, 1967.

During her husband's lifetime, Ruth (Hanford) Munn shared his interest in raising dogs and helped to make their home known for their hospitality. She was also a member of the Cambridge Plant and Garden Club. She continued her father's genealogical research. She also remained keenly interested in Wellesley College and its affairs, attending several reunions, joining the Shakespeare Society, making gifts to the Faculty Club and establishing a scholarship fund in the name of her college friend Betsey (Baird) Neville. After her husband's death, she divided her time between her home in Cambridge and the Hanford farm in Scottsville, occasionally wintering in North Carolina. She died on August 2, 1976.