Helen A. Stafford attended
Quaker schools in Philadelphia. She became an undergraduate at
Wellesley College, where she graduated in 1944 with a B.A. in botany. For the academic year 1945–1946, she worked with orchid cultures as a research assistant to
Lewis Knudson at
Cornell University. In 1946 she transferred to the
Connecticut College for Women. There she was supported by a two-year assistantship under the supervision of
Richard H. Goodwin and graduated with an M.A. in botany. Her thesis research on
timothy grass seedlings was published in 1948 in the
American Journal of Botany. Stafford and Goodwin corresponded for many years after her graduation. For three years from 1948 to 1951 she was a graduate student in the botany department of the
University of Pennsylvania, where she received her Ph.D. under the supervision of
David R. Goddard. The 1954 review established her as a leading expert on this subject. (1910–2001), who recruited her for Reed's biology department. When Stafford arrived in 1954 at Reed College, she was the first woman to join the faculty in the division of mathematics and natural sciences. She was the first Reed professor to win a Guggenheim fellowship. (who was the first woman to graduate with a Ph.D. from
Princeton University). Stafford was the author or co-author of more than 70 scientific articles. For many years, her 1990 book
Flavonoid Metabolism was a definitive text. During her career she was an outstanding teacher and role model for women scientists.
USAAF Staff Sergeant Morton Ogden Stafford Jr. (1919–1943) was an aerial gunner killed in action when his aircraft was shot down in Romania. Helen Stafford's ashes were scattered in the Reed College Canyon, ==Selected publications==