[1] In his later years, Woods worked with the Division of Military Aeronautics and was involved in government committees on unemployment under the administrations of Presidents Warren G. Harding and Herbert Hoover.

In 1905, he accompanied William Howard Taft, Nicholas Longworth, and Alice Roosevelt to the Philippines and then continued alone traveling the world for another year before returning to the United States.

[2] A staunch advocate of community policing, Woods believed that the common rank-and-file policeman should be in a position of social importance and public value.

[5] During his time as deputy commissioner, Woods became well educated on gang related violence and was a supporter of Inspector Joseph Petrosino and the "Italian Squad", a special detectives unit which combated organized crime in Italian-American neighborhoods.

[2] As part of newly elected Mayor John Purroy Mitchel's reform campaign, Woods succeeded Douglas I. McKay as New York City Police Commissioner in April 1914.

[2] His removal as police commissioner was a direct result of Mitchel's election loss to Tammany Hall-backed John Hylan, a Brooklyn judge, in 1917.

[4] He became a full colonel in August and, after a 3-month tour with the American Expeditionary Force overseas, he was appointed assistant director of military aeronautics.

[3] After his death, his widow remarried to the banker and diplomat Warren Randolph Burgess in 1955,[25][26][27] who was serving as the Undersecretary of the Treasury for Monetary Affairs in the Eisenhower administration and later was the Ambassador to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.