Jesse Wood (1839-1921), a minister in the Methodist Episcopal Church South and president of the Tuskegee Female College (est.

[2] In 1868, the Wood family moved to San Francisco before eventually settling in Chico, Butte County, California, one of the richest agricultural regions in the world.

[6] In 1900, Hazel and Waldo hired the architectural firm of William S. Hebbard and Irving J. Gill to design their new home, "Granite Cottage," located at 237 West Hawthorne St. in Bankers Hill.

[9] It is clear from her description that she was strongly drawn to the American Craftsman aesthetic of natural materials and unornamented forms deployed to harmonize with the surrounding landscape.

[5][7][8] She also attended local lectures on the Arts and Crafts movement, and her own mature aesthetic would draw on both Gill's Prairie School—inspired modernism and the American Craftsman style.

Her first commission came in 1905 from two of his former clients, the San Diego socialite Alice Lee (after whom Theodore Roosevelt named his eldest daughter) and her companion Katherine Teats.

[7] Waterman's most famous solo commission came in 1910 from businessman John D. Spreckels to restore Estudillo House in Old Town, San Diego.

Estudillo House was one of the oldest surviving examples of Spanish architecture in California, and it had gained some national fame a generation earlier by being associated with Helen Hunt Jackson's 1884 bestseller Ramona.

[5][8] Waterman worked with historical records in determining what materials should be used in the restoration and what the final plan of the rooms and gardens should be,[8] while also trying to satisfy Spreckels's desire for a renovation that would make it easier to market the site as a Ramona-themed attraction.

[8] Waterman also received a commission from the Children's Home in Balboa Park,[5][8] and she designed a garden for Julius Wangenheim that in 1933 would be awarded a Certificate of Honor by the American Institute of Architects.