George E. (George Evertson) Woodward

Born in Ithaca, New York, on September 26, 1829, George Evertson Woodward built a varied career as an engineer, architect, and publisher. Early in life he worked as an engineer for the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railroad, and by the 1850s he was living in Brooklyn, where he established himself as a civil and landscape engineer.

Woodward became especially active in New York in the 1860s and 1870s. He contributed to and co-edited The Horticulturist, an influential magazine associated with Andrew Jackson Downing’s circle, and he worked with horticulturist Peter B. Mead in the firm Mead & Woodward. Their projects included country houses, estate buildings, and other picturesque designs, often in Gothic or French-inspired styles.

He is remembered above all for the architectural pattern books he edited and published, including Woodward's National Architect and Woodward's Suburban and Country Houses. These works helped spread house plans and design ideas to readers beyond major cities, shaping the look of suburban and rural homes in the later 19th century. He later became involved in the development of Rutherford Heights in New Jersey, linking his design work to the growth of commuter suburbia.