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Name: WOODS, John
Photo Source: Old Africa magazine 105
Nee: younger brother of William Daniel Woods
Birth Date: 29 Sep 1897
First Date: 1920
Profession: Went to Kenya to farm after WW1. This was a disaster so he joined the Education Dept. Worked at the Nakuru and Kitale schools, where he eventually became Head Master. Education Officer in 1953, Principal E.P.S. Kitale. Originally Asst Master 1927
Area: Kitale, Nakuru, Eldoret Sorar Hill Estate
Married: 1. 1924 Isabel Rosamund Clark (div.) 2. 1936 Janet Flora Esdaile b. 1905
Children: 1st marriage two; 2nd marriage Peter; Jennifer Marion (1942); Jonathan Teulen (1942); Bernard
Author: John Woods, The Lion and the Bicycle
Book Reference: EAWL, Nicholson Memoirs, Staff 53, KAD, Hut, Colonial, Dominion, Red 25, Red 31, Red 22
War Service: Military service 1916-19, 2nd Lieut.
School: St. Paul's and King's College London; BA Hons. (Lond)
General Information:
Gazette 20 Dec 1927 Secretary, Golf Club, Eldoret
Gazette 6 Dec 1938 Trans Nzoia Voters List Principal, Eur. School, Kitale
Source: Ronald Bevan Jolley
Staff 39 - Education Officer European (Primary) Educ. in 1939, appointed 1927. Originally an Asst. Master 1927. Headmaster, European Primary School, Kitale in 1939
Nicholson - Kitale Primary School - it was a good Government school. Most children from the farms were boarders. The headmaster, John Woods, had been in Kenya for some time, farming and gold mining, so understood the children and their way of life.
Dominion - Education Department - Assistant Master - 1930 - J. Woods R.B. Jolley - "John Woods, younger brother of William, was born in the UK 29th September 1897. After the 14-18 war moved to Kenya with William, who was on overseas leave. Together with a Mr Gosden and Mr Walker John applied for land under the Land Settlement Scheme for returning servicemen. Collectively ended up with a 519 acre block on the Kipkarren River west of Eldoret. By 1927, after many mistakes, plus prices for maize and coffee being deplorable, John sold up and returned to the UK where he studied to become a teacher. Eventually returned to Kenya, joining the Education Dept. was now married to Rosamund Clark in December 1924. They had 2 children, supposed to have been born in Kenya. John and Rosamund divorced. John then married Janet Esdaile it is thought at Kitale in Sept. 1936. They had 2 children Peter and Jenny also born in Kitale. …………….. In 1935 John became Headmaster of Kitale School and stayed till 1950 or till he retired to the UK.
Gazette - 13/10/1926 - Dissolution of Partnership between John Woods of Eldoret, William Woods, John Forbes Walker and Frederick Joseph Gosden farming under the style or firm of 'Sorora Hill Estate'
John Edwards in Kitale School Newsletter Mid-year 2021 The headmaster, Johnny Woods, was an extraordinary man, with ideas well ahead of his time, especially in the field of sex education. Each Saturday the senior standard five classes were bundled into the school truck and taken to Mr Bowker's farm dam for swimming. We all bathed nude because Mr Woods thought nothing of it, and boys and girls together all seemed to grow up with no sexual hang-ups at all and none of the problems that some other co-ed boarding schools apparently had, so his ideas did seem to have some merit.
Old Africa magazine 105, Feb-Mar 2023 He returned to England on a long leave in c. 1930. He had spent 6 years trying to grow maize and coffee from 1920 to 1926 at a new farm on the Kipkarren river beyond Eldoret. Prices for maize and coffee dropped so dramatically in 1925 and 1926 that he sold his share in the farm and applied for a job as a teacher in the Education Dept.
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