He and his mother then moved to Monroe, Wisconsin, where he completed his education and began his interest in engineering, studying under Joseph Thompson Dodge.

[1] He briefly attended the University of Wisconsin to improve his understanding of higher mathematics, but could not afford to continue his studies.

He took up teaching in order to finance his further education, but his work was interrupted by the outbreak of the American Civil War.

[3] At the end of his two year term, he returned to the railroad industry, working on the Chicago & North Western Railway Company.

[4][5] Near the end of his life, he published a narrative called Damien and Dutton which focused on the story of Joseph Dutton, who had served with Woodman in the 13th Wisconsin Infantry and spent the rest of his life working as a Catholic missionary with Father Damien in Hawaii, ministering to the leper colony on Molokai.