Woodword, Ernest

Born in Glasco in 1898, Ernest Woodward moved from Topeka to Oberlin in 1928 with the purchase of the Oberlin Times. In 1930 the paper was consolidated with the Herald, and in 1948 Woodward bought out his partner’s interest. He continued to publish the Herald until 1966.

Woodward was five times elected to the Kansas Legislature as a state representative. He maintained his keen interest in politics and state government after he resigned from the House following the 1969 session, when he learned he had terminal cancer.

Typically, he put the interests of his constituents first, saying that they deserved a rigorous, able-bodied representative, even though he loved the legislature and time would have permitted him to finish his term.

Following his death in January of 1971, Howard Kessinger wrote of Woodward, “Emotions get in the way when a man of this caliber is remembered.”