Born Woodford Broadus Hackley in 1894 on a farm near Jeffersonton, Culpeper County, Virginia, he was the youngest child of Walter Edgar and Alice Marion Hackley. He taught for four years at Jefferson High School in Jeffersonton, and for 38 years at the University of Richmond, retiring in 1962 as Professor of Latin, Emeritus. He was a life long member of the Jeffersonton Baptist Church and published a history of that institution. He was also Secretary-Treasurer and a prominent member of the Virginia Baptist Historical Society in Richmond. Woodford wrote on various topics of local historical interest, including a history of the Little Fork Rangers (Confederate Cavalry) and an unpublished manuscript entitled "Notes on some members of the Hackley family," which traced the descendants of John Hackley of Essex and Old Rappahannock Counties, Virginia. Woodford died in 1978 and is buried in the Jeffersonton Baptist Church cemetery alongside his wife Elizabeth Clair.