| Notes |
- 1900 CA San Francisco County, San Francisco, District 160, HH 157/220, 112 R.... Street
Stafford, WilliamHeadW M May 185545 M 14MD MD MD
Stafford, MaryWifeW F Apr 185842 M 14CA NY NY
Stafford, MarjorieDaughterW F Jan 1891 9 SCA MD CA
Linstrom, PaulineServantW F 35 SSWEDEN
FROM "History of the San Francisco Bay REgion: history and biography" by Bailey Millard, in collaboration with Able Assistants, volume III, 1924.
William Gardner Stafford. For over thirty years William Gardner
Stafford was active in the commercial affairs of San Francisco, and he
founded and conducted a very prosperous business. His prosperity won
in commercial affairs he wisely used, and proved himself a man of liber
tastes and a patron of the arts.
He was iDorn at Baltimore, Maryland, December 18, 1855. son of
William John and Caroline (Gardner) Stafford, both natives of Baltimore,
though the Gardner family came from the North. William J. Stafford
was a mariner, and while commanding the merchant ship Cassilda, run-
ning between Baltimore and Rotterdam, was lost at sea in a storm during
the early '70s. The Staft'ords as a family have been identified with
the sea either as ship owners or commanders both in the navy and mercha
marines. ***The founder of the Maryland branch of the Stafford family
came to this country with Calvert. Lord Baltimore. By the marriage of
one of its members to a Miss Whipple, the late William G. Stafford was
descended directly from Abraham Whipple, leader of the exijedition to
sink the Gaspee, one of the first exploits at the opening of the Americ
Revolution, and also of his son, William Whipple, signer of the Declaration
of Independence. The great-grandfather of William G. Stafford was
another William Stafford, who commanded a privateer vessel during the
War of 1812, and single handed defeated and captured two British ships
off Cape St. Vincent. Another member of the family, William Bayard
Stafford, was lieutenant under John Paul Jones on the "Bonhomnie Rich-
ard."*** Au uncle of William G. Stafford. Joseph Stafford, was a maj
Jubal Early's staff in the Confederate .\rmy.
William Gardner Stafford was reared and educated in Baltimore. He
was about seventeen when his father was lost at sea. It had been the
plan that he would enter Princeton University, but feeling that this would
impose too heavy sacrifices upon his widowed mother he ran away to sea,
thus pursuing the ancestral calling. He left Baltimore as .sailor on a sailing
vessel, and for two years was on the high seas. In 1876 he arrived in
San Francisco, and thereafter devoted most of his business energies to
the coal industry. After more or less brief connections with various firms
he founded W. G. Stafford & Company, about 1893, and was its president
and active executive until his death in 1008. He had no other important
business interests besides the W. G. Stafford Conii)any.
He once served as school director, and fruiii 1007 until his death the
following year was supervisor under the Taylor administration. In ix)li-
tics he was a republican, and during the famous graft prosecution he
lent his moral support to Francis J. Heney and Rudolph Si)reckels, thou
he was not personally identified with any phase of the prosecution. He
THE SAN FRANCISCO BAY REGION 351
was a Knight Templar Mason and Shriner, was a member of the Pacific
Union and Hohemian Clubs, the Sons of the American Revolution and was
a director of the San Francisco Art Association.
Mr. Stafford died at his home in San Francisco, .\ugust 16, 1908. He
had twice served as vice president of the Bohemiar. Club and at other times
as a director, and helped manage the annual picture exhibits and participated
in the Christmas Jinks. All his life he was a connoisseur and a lover of
pictures, and one of his most pleasurable activities was his relations with
the Art Association and School of Design. Although not a Californian
by birth, he was extremely fond of San Francisco, and regarded the wel-
fare of the city as his personal concern.
Mr. Stafford married at San Francisco, Deceml)er 29, 1886, Miss Cor-
nelia Marsh Housman, daugter of John Harrison and Katherine (Ritch)
Housman. Her parents came from New York to California in the early
'50s, settling at Sacramento, where Mrs Stafford was born. Mrs. Stafford
died in New York in 1912, and her only surviving brother is John I._
Housman, a resident of San .'\nselmo, California. The only child of
Mr. and Mrs. Stafford is Marjorie, who was married in 1913 to Robert
Newell Fitch. She resides at 2565 Washington Street.
***This paragraph is a slight distortion of the facts, an infamously common attempt in these types of books to make one seem more important or better connected than one really is. There may very well have been a Stafford who came with Calvert, Lord Baltimore, to establish the colony of Maryland, but William Gardner Stafford is NOT descended from them. Notice the lack of specificity when it comes to the "relative" who served under John Paul Jones. The only Stafford I have found that served with JPJ was Lt. Thomas Stafford (NOT William Bayard Stafford), a son of William Stafford who reportedly came from Staffordshire to the colonies in 1743. One history says this is the ancestor of the Giles County, Staffords, but I think this may be a distortion of the truth as well...***
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1855 - 1908 (52 years)
