Mrs. John Charles (Lucile) Woodward died on April 23, 1931, in Miami, Florida where she had been for several months endeavoring to regain her health which had been declining for several years. Because she was one of the original founders and teachers of Georgia Military Academy, one who had helped foster and advance a dream, and because she had been such a strong influence and aide with Colonel Woodward and the school for thirty-one years, she received, and rightly so, many tributes.

Following Mrs. Woodward's death and realizing that his life's work was, perhaps, nearing an end, Colonel Woodward decided in 1932 that the Academy belonged in all propriety not to himself or to his associates but to the community and the state and the country which the school had served for thirty-two years. Colonel Woodward, therefore, bought back all of the outstanding stock of the school and secured a new charter incorporating Georgia Military Academy as an eleemosynary institution to be administered by a governing board composed of members of the Woodward family and selected prominent alumni. The entire campus, not including his home, "The Retreat," was deeded to the Board free from all encumbrances.

Eventually to be known as "The Great Gesture," his gift of the Academy to the Governing Board was highlighted in his dedicatory remarks in May of 1932.

"Thirty-two years ago, while in the early part of life's journey, Mrs. Woodward and I accepted an invitation from the leading citizens of College Park, with a population of three hundred people, to found here a school for boys. Here we dedicated our lives on grounds covered with weeds, briars, gullies, cornstalks, and a few scrubby trees growing on an old Confederate breastwork, one building with broken windows, smashed doors and leaking roof, with no water, lights, or sanitary conveniences. We had in hand about $1,500.00 with which to organize G.M.A.""

"With our meager earnings we were able to borrow to build Rugby, then the Annex, and in order, the old gym, Y.M.C.A., Sentinel, Memorial, South Cottage, the swimming pool and the new gym. From two teachers our faculty has increased to twenty-four. From thirty boys we have grown to present proportions. The beautiful shade trees and many of the shrubs and flowers were planted by my wife. Here under many excellent teachers, thousands of fine boys from many states and countries have dreamed and aspired to nobler ideals and laid the foundations in character for great men in the world's work in all fields of endeavor and service. Hundreds of homes and offices have on their walls G.M.A. diplomas - some one, some two, some three, some four, one five and soon one will have six. Our cadets have represented the spirit and pride of Atlanta on many occasions at home and abroad, and always with honor. We have had honor men in many colleges and universities, and in peace and war the escutcheons of our men have shown with distinction."

"Four of my children are settled in their life work. My youngest daughters graduate very soon at Agnes Scott College, my wife's work is finished, my own shadows are lengthening, and I begin to see the rays fading toward the sunset. In the calmness of reason, poor in this world's goods, but rich in the memories of the splendid men whose early training I had the privilege and honor to share, here in the environs of a great educational, industrial, commercial center in the challenging Southland, I must put my humble house in order."

"What shall I do with G.M.A.? Is such a school needed in the training and development of many types of our future citizens? Are a good name and thirty-two years of consecrated service rendered by my wife, many good teachers and myself worth preserving, enriching, and stablizing?"

"And so, duty to my wife, my fellow teachers, my thousands of "old boys," the great city of Atlanta, my country and the great cause of education - that duty seems to say and compel me to give G.M.A. the best chance to live and serve through years, and perhaps through centuries. And so I wish to give it to those who love it, my children and a representative group of its graduates, and through them to the youth of the land. In dollars and cents, it is almost insignificant. Were I able to give you a million for endowment, perhaps for some charity, I would be applauded as a great benefactor; but I can only give you what I have; and I do so with confidence that you will foster, guide, enlarge, and ennoble and increase its usefulness. Through it you can send out rich currents of ever-increasing service in the making of men and high and noble character in all walks of life and to the glory of God."

"It will please me to know that you will honor Mrs. Woodward's memory and service by giving to her grandsons scholarships in the school; that you will respect the scholarships now offered, that when you are able financially you will offer day scholarships on a character and competitive examination basis - one to every Junior High School in Fulton County, College Park and Atlanta and one to my native county of Butts. May I also request that, as far as your finances will allow, you will never turn away from the school a worthy, deserving, ambitious boy yearning for an education?"

"Having been born the year after the close of the Civil War, when my father's possessions were reduced to lands and a large family of children, when we had no schools and few books, I was a mentally hungry country lad, the youngest in a large family, with all odds against a boy's ambition. So my heart goes out to boys of this class, for often they pass through the trials and hardships of privation to become leaders and shining lights in all spheres of life."

"In conclusion, with my children and Major Rosser, all of whom have turned their holdings over to me, permit me here and now to place the deeds of all of the property in College Park belonging to the Georgia Military Academy in your possession and dedicate my life-work, small as it is, through you to the greatest of all causes, the education and training of today's youth and tomorrow's citizens."

"Finally, with prayers from Divine guidance and reasonable measures of health and strength, with expressions of gratitude to the thousands of parents, who have honored me with the opportunity of service with their children, I now dedicate the remainder of my life to those who are partial to the spirit and service of Georgia Military Academy..."

On May 22, 1932, an article appeared in the Atlanta Journal editorializing on Colonel Woodward's gift of Georgia Military Academy:

"Too frequently it happens that a lifework like this ceases or diminishes with the passing of its builder. Colonel Woodward, looking beyond himself to the needs and interest of other generations, has taken the step to prevent that mischance."

"There we see a nobility worthy of the life it crowns and of the cause it serves. Freely and modestly Colonel Woodward has given all that he has to the perpetuation of all that is above price. Fortunately for the institution, he has consented to continue at its helm. That it may grow as wonderfully in usefulness and prestige in the years ahead as in those behind, is not only the wish but the confident belief of its multitude of friends, especially those in Atlanta to whose educational repute the Georgia Military Academy has so notably contributed."

Further, an editorial from the Atlanta Constitution, May 23, 1932, entitled "Perpetuating an Ideal":

"The gift of the Georgia Military Academy by Colonel John C. Woodward, its founder and owner, to a board of trustees is in keeping with the splendid record of public service which has been set up by this widely known educator."

"Starting 32 years ago with three teachers and 30 students, G.M.A., under the leadership of Colonel Woodward, has progressed until it is now one of the best known preparatory schools in the country, with students from many states and several foreign countries."

"This remarkable growth is due almost entirely to the genius of Colonel Woodward as an educator and to his remarkable executive ability."

"Too often in the past, schools, which have exerted a splendid influence, have faded and died upon the death of their founders. That such may not be the fate of G.M.A., Colonel Woodward, while still in the prime of life, has turned the institution he has built over to a group of its graduates so that his ideal of an outstanding preparatory school for the community will not suffer when, because of advancing years, he is called upon to relinquish the active direction of its affairs."

"Having devoted so many years to the upbuilding of the institution, it is fortunate for it that Colonel Woodward will continue as its head during his active life. Being still in the full vigor of both mind and body it means that G.M.A. will have the benefit for many years of the inspired guidance which has made it the outstanding institution it now is."

"Atlanta's standing as a center of southern educational activities will be all the more strengthened by the assurance that G.M.A. will continue to grow as the years go by."

Georgia Military Academy, no longer a privately-owned institution by its founder and his children but an eleemosynary boy's preparatory school governed by a self- perpetuating board of alumni and the Woodward children, began. During the next seven years, until the death of Colonel Woodward, the Academy would advance its place in southern education.

Although Colonel Woodward had deeded Georgia Military Academy to a governing board, he included in his will a reversionary clause which stated that should Georgia Military Academy ever cease to operate as an educational institution that all of the Academy's assets would be equally divided among his heirs. In order to truly free the Academy from "all encumberances," and to clear away any possible hinderances this clause might have had toward fund raising, the Governing Board, championed by Captain William R. Brewster, Jr., attempted to have the reversionary clause released by Colonel Woodward's heirs. The attempt, however, has not been completely successful so far.

Excerpt from “The Woodward Story”, by Robert Ballentine, published 1990 by Jostens Printing and Publishing; content used with permission of the copyright holder, Woodward Academy Inc., College Park, Georgia, USA.