Born in Pittsfield, Vermont, Gilbert Simeon Boardman (1833-1917) was the son of Samuel Ward Boardman, a minister, and Ann Gilbert Boardman and had three older brothers. He received his education at the Castleton Seminary in Vermont and graduated from Middlebury College, also in Vermont in 1855. He later entered the Albany Law School. Before coming to Kalamazoo, he lived for three years from 1855 to 1857 in Turtle Creek, Alleghany County, Pennsylvania.

It is not known how long he lived in Kalamazoo or why he came to the area. He does mention in the second letter that many of the lawyers in the village received their education at Middlebury College. He does mention in the first letter that he doesn’t think he would settle in Kalamazoo but there is a notice in the March 8, 1861 Kalamazoo Gazette that a letter is waiting for him at the post office. He could have left the area by then. By 1863 he is back at Middlebury where he registered for the draft. By 1870 he is living in Milford, Delaware and two years later is ordained a minister in the Presbyterian Church. It is around that time that he changes the order of his name and becomes Simeon G. Boardman. He also is known as S. Gilbert Boardman. He marries Helen V. Caton (1840-1931) in 1875. For the next forty-five years the couple lived in Delaware, New York and Pennsylvania. They had no children and are buried in Hartsville, Bucks County, Pennsylvania alongside Helen’s brother Lewis Caton and his wife Elizabeth Irwin Caton.