Named in 1917 for Frederic Thomas Woodman (1872-1949), then mayor of Los Angeles. Although another historian claims that the street was actually named for “Woodman Ranch”, which I found no trace of, a January 18th, 1917 article in the Los Angeles Times explicitly stated that the former Castro Avenue was rechristened in honor of hizzoner. (Several other pols received Valley street names that year: see Topham, Langdon, Woodley.) Fred Woodman hailed from New Hampshire, where he forged a career as an attorney. He and his wife Etta came to L.A. in 1908 – they were newlyweds – and he hung out his shingle once again. Four years later, Woodman was appointed president of the city’s Harbor Commission. He rose to the mayoralty in September 1916, selected by City Council after the resignation of scandal-plagued mayor Charles Sebastian. It was a fateful year for Woodman: Etta had died that April. He was re-elected in 1917 but lost his bid for a third term in 1919 amidst charges of graft. (He was acquitted.) Woodman then got into the auto finance business and married Katherine Winter, a childless widow twelve years his junior, in 1921.