Over the years, many prominent people have lived in the house, including: , the creator of Woodley.
Philip Barton Key Philip Barton Key, born into a prominent family of Maryland planters, sacrificed his inheritance to fight for a Loyalist regiment in the American Revolution. He was eventually captured, paroled, and sent to England, where he studied law at the
Middle Temple of the Inns at Court. While there, he visited Prime Minister
Henry Addington at the Woodley Lodge. When Key returned to Washington, D.C., he modeled his own home after the original lodge in England. shaped the character of the area around Woodley during his stay there.
Francis Newlands Francis Newlands, a beneficiary of the Comstock Silver Mine, was both a politician and a real estate tycoon. As Senator from Nevada, he championed the Newlands Reclamation Act of 1901, which culminated in the irrigation of huge sections of the West. At the local level, he developed the suburb of
Chevy Chase, boosting his land's value by extending
Connecticut Avenue, building a
streetcar line, and helping to create
Rock Creek Park. After renting Woodley to the Clevelands in 1893, he added a block of rooms on the east side of the building and moved in himself around 1900. , a diplomat and an Undersecretary of State, lived in Woodley from 1915 to 1919.
William Phillips William Phillips was a career diplomat and a lifelong friend of Franklin Roosevelt. When he and his wife Caroline rented Woodley (1915–1919), he was Assistant Secretary of State and also the host of numerous dinners attended by the Roosevelts. Phillips went on to a career as ambassador to Belgium, Canada and Italy, where for six years, he tried to keep Mussolini's ambitions in check. He continued to serve in many vital overseas assignments under his old friend Franklin Roosevelt until his official retirement in 1944.
Henry L. Stimson in 1929, around the time he purchased Woodley.
Henry L. Stimson purchased Woodley in 1929, and was its last private owner-resident. He served as
Secretary of State during the Hoover administration, and was the
Secretary of War for both Franklin Roosevelt and
Harry Truman during
World War II, until his retirement in September 1945. When Stimson and his wife Mabel bought Woodley, they added cloakrooms (now little offices) on either side of the portico. It was widely reported at the time that Stimson had paid $1,000,000 () for Woodley, but later reports put the sale cost at around $750,000 () or $850,000 (). Later reports said that Stimson attempted to give Woodley to the federal government to serve as the official residence of the Secretary of State. This was unsuccessful, allegedly because it was feared that other cabinet officers would desire official homes. Stimson also reportedly offered to
Andrew Mellon as the site for the
National Gallery of Art if its Constitution Avenue location could not be secured. He and his wife continued living in Woodley until 1947.
Adolf Berle Adolf Berle, one of the architects of the New Deal, rented Woodley from Stimson in 1939. Once again, Woodley became the place of high drama. On the evening of September 1,
Whittaker Chambers arrived at Woodley to tell Berle that
Alger Hiss, a highly respected member of the State Department, was passing top-secret documents to the
Soviets. That accusation would eventually culminate in the trial of Hiss. (He was found guilty of perjury and went to prison.) Among the many guests at Woodley during the Berle year was Secretary of State
Cordell Hull, who would sneak away during afternoons to play croquet on the Woodley
croquet lawn;
Albert Einstein, who came to a Woodley reception; and
Charles W. Yost, Berle's assistant, who was invited to view Julian Bryan's horrifying photographs of the Warsaw siege.
Maret School In 1948, about a year after the Stimsons had moved out, Phillips Academy listed Woodley for sale. Initially denied their rezoning request, Maret finally received permission to operate a school in the building in June 1951, after Maret agreed to use only the first floor of the building as a school and to make no external changes to the building. In August 1952, a "major part" of the mansion was reported destroyed in a three-alarm fire, as it was being remodeled for use in the fall semester. The damage was estimated at $100,000 (). The school opened successfully in September. ==Legacy==