Stephen Hammond

Stephen Hammond, a family historian and Denver, Colorado native, is a retired federal employee having spent his entire 40-year career as an earth scientist with the United States Geological Survey. He is now a Scientist Emeritus with the agency.

Steve is a 7th generation member of the Syphax family of Washington, D.C.: a family line that moved by force to New Orleans and then by choice to Denver. He has participated in a variety of National Park Service programs at Arlington House – the Robert E. Lee Memorial to highlight the lives of his Syphax ancestors and other enslaved Americans on the estate. He has spoken at the African American Civil War Museum and the historic Decatur House on Lafayette Square both in Washington, D.C. and has contributed to exhibits at George Washington’s Mount Vernon and the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture. He has been interviewed by numerous organizations and most recently was featured in a story on CBS This Morning that talked about the reopening of the Arlington House after a 3-year closure for restoration. His goals are to educate and inspire others to research and document their own family history.

Other genealogy interests revolve around research on the movement of enslaved ancestors to New Orleans, Louisiana where his ancestry covers both enslaved and free people between 1769 to 1900. A primary focus is on the period leading up to and including the Civil War and the Reconstruction era.

Steve is a charter member of the Sons and Daughters of the United States Middle Passage and the Society of the First African Families of English America. He also is a member of the Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War, the Louisiana Historical Society and the James Dent Walker Chapter of the Afro-American Historical and Genealogical Society in Washington, D.C.

He was named a Virginia Humanities Scholar for his work in exploring African-American life and achievement in Virginia. He currently serves as a Trustee for the Arlington House Foundation and is a Trustee Emeritus at his alma mater, Whitman College where he gave the 2022 commencement speech and received an honorary doctorate.

He resides in Sterling, Virginia. He and his wife Charlotte have two adult daughters, a grandson, and twin granddaughters.