Ira Ulysses Kauffman (May 18, 1881 - December 27, 1937) was an American civil engineer. Born in Massalon, Ohio, Kauffman moved to Atlanta, Georgia, in 1903, where he worked with his brother Orrin Frederick Kauffman (1876 - 1930) in the engineering firm O.F. Kauffman and Brother. Orrin suffered health and personal problem starting in 1929, leading to his suicide in 1930. Likely he retired from the business sometime in 1929, as in that year, Ira opened his own engineering firm with his son in 1929 called I.U. Kauffman and Son, which would later become I.U. Kauffman and Sons, and later the Southern Map Company. At the time of his death, Kauffman worked as chief engineer of the Georgia division of the United States Coast and Geodetic Survey. Over the course of his career, Kauffman helped lay out the Druid Hills, Ansley Park, and Avondale Estates developments, as well as the Camp Gordon and Fort Benning army posts. Kauffman died unexpectedly of a cerebral hemorrhage. One of Kauffman's sons, William R. Kauffman (April 19, 1911 - December 19, 1978), served in the U.S. Navy Seabees in the South Pacific for thirty months during World War II. After being discharged from the Navy, William Kauffman founded an engineering firm in Atlanta called Kauffman and Harman.