On October 28, 1842, Edgar Oren Durfee was born to Reuben Stark and Besty Kingsley (Noble) Durfee on a farm in Livonia, Michigan. As a boy he attended the old logcabin schoolhouse at Newburgh Road with his brother, Charles. It was not recorded exactly how long he attended, but in 1856, his father, Reuben purchased a stock farm on Territorial Road in Plymouth, and the family than moved there.

When the 24th Michigan Regiment was being formed, Edgar, and his brother, Charles enlisted together, with many other neighborhood boys from Livonia and Plymouth. One of his fellow tentmates, was Alfred Ryder.
It was at the Battle of Gettysburg when Edgar's right arm was shattered by a minnie ball. As he was attempting to get behind the lines to a hospital, when he was wounded in the calf of his leg, also. Eventually he found his way to a field hospital, that was set up in a church about three miles from were he had been wounded, in McPherson's Woods. The people in charge of the hospital, afraid they may be captured by the oncoming Confederate Army, moved their patients to the court house on the other side of the city. There, Durfee was placed on a desk, which served as an operating table, and his arm was amputated at the shoulder. Many years later, in a moment of jest, Durfee told a young newspaper reporter, fresh from the the farmlands of Washtenaw County that he had lost the arm in a threshing machine accident. The story was published, somehow getting past the city editor, who already knew the real history. Friends of Durfee, and his staff, were angered by this apparent attempt at slander, seized the boy and locked him in the court vault for a whole day without food or water.
Durfee, feeling badly, granted the innocent reporter the only personal interview he ever permitted, on condition it would not be printed, as he did not wish to appear a hero or capitalize on his war record.
Eventually the story did appear in the Detroit Free Press about four years after Durfee's death, which occured on April 28, 1927.
The article stated in part:

"I was a Private in the Twenty-Fourth Michigan Infantry, which was a part of the first division, first corps, of the so-called Iron Brigade. On the first day of the three-day battle of Gettysburg, July 1, 1863, a weak Union force which included my regiment, commanded by General McPherson, was sent three miles north of Gettysburg, beyond Seminary Ridge, to intercept Confedate skirmishers. We ran into trouble at the edge of a 40-acre patch of woods where General McPherson and his staff were ambushed and the general was shot from his horse and killed. The infantry charged into the woods and cleaned up, driving the Johnnies back to capturing an entire regiment.... If any army was ever thrashed, our army was in the first days's fight, and that's why I say I did lose my arm in a threshing machine."

Following his discharge from the army Edgar worked in the office of the Treasury Department for a year before returning home. Then for two years he attended the Normal School at Ypsilanti. He then went to work in an abstract office in Detroit followed by a short employ with the Corporation Council. In 1873, he became registrar of the Probate Court. Four years later he was elected Judge of Probate on the Republican ticket for a four year term. He held his spot as Probate Judge for a record 12 more four year terms, and became a legend in his time. He was highly respected as a fair, honest, and devoted civil servant.
Durfee is also credited with being one of the men responsible for getting a baseball franchise in Detroit, for the National League in 1886. The following year, Detroit was named league champion.
Another of Durfee's hobbies was duck-hunting. Although he had only one arm, he was a member of the North Channel Club in St Clair Flats. He was also ranked one of the area's leading flower raisers, paying particular attention to roses.

Shortly before his death in 1927, the Detroit Board of Education approved the naming of a future school after him. A noteworthy honor to a remarkable man, whose life work was centered around the legal protection of countless children in the probate court.

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