The Woodwards have left their mark throughout county where they’ve practiced law for four generations.
Photos of a grandfather and grandson, both wearing solemn expressions, hang two rows apart in a gallery of judges on the Montgomery County Circuit Courthouse walls. Mentions of them pop up in faded news clippings and at least one history book. Perhaps most significantly, the name of the family patriarch, Charles W. Woodward, is stripped across the outside of a Rockville school building.
And the family hopes to keep it there, despite a recent push by some county leaders to rename the school after the Rev. Josiah Henson, a man whose fight for freedom inspired the novel “Uncle Tom’s Cabin.”
“This school was named in 1965 and … has created a legacy amongst its students and in that community, and changing the name at least in my view would be losing that legacy,” said Chief Judge Patrick Woodward, who heads the Maryland Court of Special Appeals, the state’s second-highest court.
County Council President Hans Riemer and Montgomery County first lady Catherine Leggett are behind the effort to dedicate the school to Henson when it reopens in 2022.
Woodward High closed in 1987 amid an enrollment slump, and the building on Old Georgetown Road is currently holding Tilden Middle School students displaced by an ongoing construction project.
After the middle schoolers move out, work will begin to modernize and expand Woodward before it’s ready to function again as a high school.
Riemer and Leggett argue the reopening is a perfect opportunity to honor Henson, who worked on a plantation near the school and probably walked the land where it now stands. Henson is one of the county’s “greatest unsung heroes,” they say, with his contributions to local and national history buried in the aftermath of Jim Crow and segregation.
“When Woodward opened up, it wouldn’t have been maybe on anyone’s mind to name a school after a significant abolitionist figure who lived in Montgomery County,” Riemer said. “They didn’t look for that story.”
The disagreement has arisen years ahead of when the school board will actually select a name, but comes as many communities grapple with calls for reexamining the names of roads, bridges, schools and other landmarks in light of the nation’s history of racism. Earlier this year, student journalists at Watkins Mill High School reported that only one Montgomery County high school is named after an African American. Three high schools—Col. Zadok Magruder, Thomas S. Wootton and Richard Montgomery—are named after slave owners.
No one in this specific case has disputed that Charles Woodward was an esteemed member of the community who deserved to have a school in his name. And for his part, Judge Woodward says he doesn’t disagree that Henson’s name should be on a school. He just doesn’t want it to be Woodward High.
On Aug. 23, he sent the school board a letter that outlined his position and chronicled the life and accomplishments of his grandfather, Judge Charles W. Woodward.
“During his tenure on the bench, Judge Woodward gained the reputation as a tough, but fair judge. He held himself to the highest standards of honesty, integrity, and impartiality,” Patrick Woodward wrote. “In short, Judge Woodward became a shining example of equal justice under the law.”
A Georgia native, Charles Woodward in 1915 moved to Montgomery County, where he spent some time teaching and practicing law. After serving for several years as the county’s police court judge, the 37-year-old graduated to the Montgomery County Circuit Court and still holds a record as the youngest person ever named to that bench.
Woodward’s most important ruling on the bench—in a 1937 case brought by Thurgood Marshall when he was young attorney—triggered a cascade of court decisions in favor of equal pay for African-American teachers and helped galvanize the school desegregation effort, his grandson says.
Marshall and his co-counsel appeared in court representing a black public school principal in Montgomery County who complained that African-American educators in the public school system were only paid about half the salaries of comparable white teachers. The school board denied any right to equal pay, and Woodward invited two circuit court judges from Frederick County to join him for the hearing where the two sides would argue their cases. The three-judge panel ultimately ruled against Montgomery County Public Schools, which chose to settle the case and close the pay gap between black and white teachers.
Marshall, who went on to become the nation’s first black Supreme Court justice, replicated the case in other school districts across Maryland and later in 14 other states, according to Woodward. A professor at the University of Maryland Francis King Carey School of Law has written that the wave of cases expanded the reach of the Constitution’s Equal Protection Clause “in a way that ultimately led to [Brown v. Board of Education] and the demise of all government enforced racial segregation.”
The Board of Education named Woodward High after Charles Woodward in 1965.
Circuit Court Judge Cheryl McCally, a Woodward graduate, said she was present at the school opening where the judge put his own spin on the “three Rs” of education—according to him, the “Rs” should stand for rights, respect and responsibility. The high school embraced the three values as its motto, and McCally has them inscribed on her class ring. The motto and Woodward’s example have shaped the way she thinks about serving as a judge, she said.
“There has to be respect, I believe, not only for people but for the law, and I think he taught me that very much, and the responsibility of being fair-minded never leaves. Each time you pick up a new file, you have to remember your responsibility to the community and to people,” she said.
Patrick Woodward said his grandfather and father, who was a district court judge in Montgomery County, set an example for him to follow. All three have passed their values down to a fourth generation, represented by Patrick’s daughter, Carlotta Woodward, who is a prosecutor in Montgomery County’s juvenile court.
After recently meeting with Patrick Woodward, Riemer said he now has a greater appreciation for Charles Woodward’s accomplishments but continues to believe that Woodward High should be named in honor of Henson.
Henson was born in 1789 in southern Maryland and during his youth was enslaved on the plantation of Isaac Riley in North Bethesda. Because of his physical strength and leadership skills, Riley assigned Henson to sell his farm produce in D.C., according to the Smithsonian Magazine. Henson couldn’t read until later in life—he was badly beaten as a child when he tried to learn—but he became a preacher by memorizing Bible passages.
Henson’s attempts to buy his own freedom were thwarted when Riley stole his money, but Henson later fled to Canada. He helped others escape slavery over the Underground Railroad.
In Canada at age 60, he published his autobiography, The Life of Josiah Henson, which served as the inspiration for Harriet Beecher Stowe’s famous novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin. He died at age 94, and his home in Ontario has been preserved as a historic site.
Recently, there has been renewed interest in Henson’s story, with the recent release of the Josiah documentary film and a biography called The Road to Dawn.
School board President Michael Durso has said he appreciates the Henson suggestion but feels it’s a bit premature to discuss Woodward High’s name. The school system has a process for selecting school names that relies on gathering input from community members and which will get underway closer to the school’s expected opening date.
Bethany Rodgers can be reached at bethany.rodgers@moco360.media.
