Edmund Clarence Stedman, 1833-1908, was an American poet, notable literary critic of American literature, and banker. He was born in Hartford, Connecticut. In his early life he worked as a journalist and then transitioned to working as a banker; in 1864, he opened his own brokerage firm on Wall Street. He wrote respectable but perhaps not very enduring poetry, which was collected in Poetical Works (1873). As a literary critic, he was an early praiser of Walt Whitman and Edgar Allan Poe, editing an edition of Poe with G.E. Woodberry. He also worked on the 11-volume A Library of American Literature, with Ellen M. Hutchinson (1888-90), and An American Anthology (1900).

Laura Stedman, 1881-1939, was Stedman's granddaughter. George M. Gould was Laura Stedman's husband.