The Brinton family papers document several generations of the Brinton, Steinmetz, and Ward families, who flourished between 1760-1930 in Pennsylvania and New York. Several members of the family played prominent roles in their communities and included landholders, real estate developers, merchants, Civil War surgeons, medical doctors and professors, missionaries, a minister, an art critic, an anthropologist, lawyers, a judge, an engineer, and several authors.