Leonard Cutler Sanford (September 19, 1869 – December 7, 1950) was an American surgeon and amateur ornithologist who served as a trustee of the American Museum of Natural History for nearly thirty years and who was instrumental in building up its bird collections.

[1] Although Sanford was elected a trustee of the museum in February 1921, his association with the institution had begun much earlier.

The Brewster-Sanford Expedition, headed by Rollo Beck, took place from 1912 to 1917 and produced a large number of specimens, providing the basis for studies resulting in the publication of Robert Cushman Murphy’s two-volume “Oceanic Birds of South America”.

Even after Whitney's death in 1930, Sanford persuaded his widow, Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney, and children to acquire for the museum the huge bird collection, of some 280,000 specimens, of Lord Rothschild’s private museum at Tring in England.

Also, a species of lizard, Sanford's emo skink (Emoia sanfordi ), is named in his honor.