Multnomah-Statewide County OR Archives Biographies.....Woodward, Tyler January 9, 1835 - February 22, 1914
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Ila L. Wakley iwakley@msn.com May 28, 2010, 8:32 pm

Source: History of the Columbia River Valley From The Dalles to the Sea, Vol. III, Published 1928, Pages 326 - 328
Author: The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company

     TYLER WOODWARD.  It was a distinguished coterie who were the builders of 
Portland and the promoters of her greatness. An outstanding figure in this 
circle was Tyler Woodward, for many years actively associated with railway 
interests and with the real estate business in the northwest and who was 
accounted a prominent and influential citizen both officially and financially. 
It is said that to fully understand any individual one must have knowledge of 
his ancestry, and undoubtedly the sterling qualities of Tyler Woodward had 
their origin in his Puritan forebears. From England the pioneer American 
ancestor came to the new world, settling in the colony of Connecticut at a 
very early period. Members of the family were stanch Congregationalists, 
serving as deacons in the church, as selectmen of the town, and still others 
rendered valuable service as physicians, lawyers, mechanics and farmers. 
Gideon Woodward, the grandfather of Tyler Woodward, served in the 
Revolutionary war and was the father of Erastus Woodward, who was born in 
Connecticut but was reared in New Hampshire. Erastus Woodward wedded Sarah 
Gilson, a native of Massachusetts and, like her husband, of Puritan descent. 
Her father, James Gilson, and her husband, Erastus Woodward, were both 
soldiers of the War of 1812. Mr. and Mrs. Woodward resided for a time in 
Portsmouth, New Hampshire, but afterward removed to Hartland, Windsor county, 
Vermont, where the birth of Tyler Woodward occurred on the 9th of January, 
1835. In Iowa, where the father passed away in 1870, the mother survived for 
only four years.

     Tyler Woodward began his education in the public schools of his native 
town and later attended academies in Kimball, Union and Meriden, New 
Hampshire, and in Thetford, Vermont. In 1860 he left New England and made the 
long journey to Marysville, California, where he became a clerk in the employ 
of his brother Gideon in the Western Hotel. At the time of the gold excitement 
in 1861 he went to Washoe, Nevada, and for some months engaged in sawmilling 
on the Truckee river but in the spring of 1862 sold his business there and 
came to Oregon. From that time forward he was closely associated with all of 
the pioneer experiences of life in this state and with its later-day 
development and advancement. He met with success in mining operations near 
Florence and Canyon City, finding one nugget of gold weighing three ounces. 
For a year he clerked in a store at the John Day mines in eastern Oregon and 
later went to Umatilla, where he engaged in freighting with pack mules to the 
mines for about a year. In the spring of 1864 he purchased a stock of general 
merchandise and miners' supplies, loaded a pack train and started for the 
Stinking Water mines in Montana, joining L. H. Wakefield, who was interested 
in the same train. Together they undertook the journey, which was fraught with 
many dangers because of the unsettled condition of the country, the hostility 
of the Indians and the lawlessness of certain white men. They packed their 
goods a distance of three hundred and fifty miles through a wild and 
mountainous country and in July reached Hell Gate, where Mr. Woodward started 
business in a house built by John Grant. He had further acquaintance with 
frontier conditions during a four-year period near the present site of 
Missoula, Montana, there carrying on business under the firm name of Woodward, 
Clement & Company until Mr. Clement sold his interest, when the firm style of 
Woodward & Wakefield was adopted. At first they purchased supplies in Spokane 
and they drew their trade from a large territory. Later Mr. Woodward arrived 
in Portland, where he became acquainted with Cicero H. Lewis of the firm of 
Allen & Lewis, and this was the beginning of a lifelong and very intimate 
friendship between these two men. Mr. Woodward continued merchandising for six 
years and also engaged in stock raising and farming but in 1870 sold his 
interests at Hell Gate and left there on horseback, carrying with him about 
thirty thousand dollars in gold that he had accumulated. It was necessary for 
him to cover more than three hundred miles in a wild and desolate country. 
While living at Hell Gate he had been an active member of the Vigilantes and 
had done much to preserve law and order. On his journey he was followed by 
several bandits who were desperate characters, yet years of residence in this 
wild country had made him familiar with the characters infesting mining camps 
and he was aware of the danger confronting him. His safety became a question 
of endurance and strategy, but through his accurate knowledge of the country 
and his constant watchfulness he succeeded in eluding the bandits and reached 
Spokane Falls in safety. Had they overtaken him, he would probably have lost 
not only his money but his life. While he was living at Hell Gate he and his 
partner were the only two educated men in that entire district besides two 
Jesuit priests who lived ten miles distant and with whom they often visited.

     Arriving in Portland, Mr. Woodward invested extensively in city property 
and became a member of the real estate firm of Parrish, Atkinson & Woodward, 
which operated successfully for many years. In the early days people viewed 
his operations in a questionable way, feeling that such investments were most 
hazardous, but Mr. Woodward had unlimited faith in the future of the country 
and time has sustained his judgment. He continued to invest in property which 
in later years brought to him most substantial returns. He also became 
interested in other important enterprises which were of notable worth to the 
city as well as to the stockholders. He was one of the organizers of the 
Transcontinental Street Railway Company, of which he served as president for 
years, and he was one of the promoters and heavy stockholders in the Walla 
Walla Railroad extending from Walla Walla, Washington, to Pendleton, Oregon. 
He likewise was interested in many mining enterprises, but street railways and 
real estate comprised his major business activities, all of which were of a 
character that contributed in large measure to the growth and prosperity of 
the northwest. For several years he remained president and manager of the 
Street Railway Company which he organized and which was later consolidated 
with the Willamette Bridge Railroad Company, and a director. The early 
building of these railway lines had a marvelous, effect on real estate 
valuation and Mr. Woodward deserved the greatest credit. He always looked 
beyond the exigencies of the moment to the opportunities of the future and 
built for a later period with results that were far-reaching and beneficial. 
The great fires of 1873 and 1874 wiped out much of his income property, but he 
was undiscouraged even in the face of disaster. He early purchased acreage 
near Council Crest and laid out Fairmont boulevard, now one of the most 
beautiful drives in Oregon. Other roads on Council Crest also came into 
existence through his efforts. In the later years of his residence in Portland 
he became interested in banking and was associated with Jacob Kamm and others 
in organizing the United States National Bank. Later, when that bank merged 
with the Wells Fargo and Ainsworth National Bank, he sold his interests.

     On the 8th of November, 1872, Mr. Woodward married Miss Mary J. Ross, a 
daughter of Sherry and Rebecca (Deardorf) Ross. Her father was an Oregon 
pioneer who took up a donation land claim on Ross Island. Her mother's people 
were also early residents of this state, settling in Happy Valley, Multnomah 
county. It was in 1849 that Sherry Ross reached California and in 1850 he 
removed to Oregon, later conducting a dairy business on Ross Island, where his 
daughter, Mrs. Woodward, was born. She arranged that land near Guild's lake be 
sold and the money be used as a memorial to her father in the building of a 
dormitory for boys at the state university. Mrs. Woodward also endowed 
Woodward Hall at Albany College. She died January 3, 1927. She had for many 
years survived her husband, who passed away February 22, 1914.

     Mr. and Mrs. Woodward had but one child, Mayannah, who in 1904 became the 
wife of Rev. Boudinot Seeley, of Portland, a son of L. B. and Amelia Seeley. 
He was educated in the public schools, in the Portland Academy and in Williams 
College at Williamstown, Massachusetts, before he entered upon preparation for 
the ministry. After attending the Union Theological Seminary in New York he 
became a student in the theological seminary at Princeton and was ordained to 
the ministry of the Presbyterian church. His first pastorate was at 
Wilmington, Delaware, and later he had charge of a church at Germantown, 
Philadelphia. Coming to Portland, he became pastor of the newly organized Rose 
City Park Presbyterian church. At that time there was no house of worship, but 
during his pastorate two churches were built. Four years ago Rev. Mr. Seeley 
was recalled to Germantown but resigned his pastorate there following the 
death of his mother and of Mrs. Woodward. He and his wife then returned to 
Portland. After twenty-five years in the ministry he is devoting his attention 
to private work and to writing, his influence remaining a potent force for 
moral uplift. Mr. and Mrs. Seeley have one child, Tyler Woodward, now a 
student in Williams College.

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