RALPH C. WOOD PAPERS
Herbert Hoover Presidential Library
West Branch, Iowa
The papers of economist Ralph C. Wood (1911-1994) comprise 3.7 linear feet of correspondence, reports, and publications that document Wood’s years as an advisor within the Division of International Finance of the Federal Reserve Board, as well as his earlier experience working in Europe in programs which distributed Marshall Plan aid. The Ralph C. Wood Papers were donated to the Herbert Hoover Presidential Library in 1995.
Ralph Clinton Wood was born in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, but spent most of his youth in Albany, New York. Wood left Albany in 1930 to attend college at Wesleyan University in Connecticut, where he obtained a bachelor’s degree in history in 1934 and a master’s degree in economics in 1935. Wood then moved to New York, where he began a graduate fellowship that fall at Columbia University, with the goal of working toward a doctorate in economics.
In 1936, however, he was hired on as an agent of the National Bureau of Economic Research for the Works Progress Administration’s National Research Project on Reemployment Opportunities and Recent Changes in Industrial Techniques. He traveled around the country surveying brick manufacturers and flourmills, supervising the compilation of statistical studies. This same year, he married Dorothy Hays. In the fall of 1937 he returned to Columbia to resume his studies, which he pursued until 1940, when he took a position with the Department of Commerce in Washington.
Military service during World War II put his career in Washington on hold, but after his discharge in 1946, he returned, hoping to complete his dissertation and pursue a career in academia. However, in 1948 he was offered the position of Assistant Chief of Finance with the Economic Cooperation Administration, which sent him to Paris to help administer the Marshall Plan aid program. Wood and his family spent the next seven years in Paris, where Wood also served as a U.S. alternate representative to the Managing Board of the European Payments Union, as well as Deputy Director of the Finance Division of USRO (United States Mission to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and European Regional Organizations).
In 1955 Wood returned to the United States, and that fall joined the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve, first as Chief of the Central and Eastern European Section, Division of International Finance, and within a few years, Chief of the European Section. During the late 1950s, Wood researched and wrote much about the European Economic Community, and the likelihood of a move toward a common currency. By the early 1960s, Wood’s emphasis changed, as he took a leave of absence for one year from the Fed to study international liquidity and the payments imbalance as a Federal Executive Fellow at the Brookings Institution in Washington. Upon his return to the Federal Reserve, Wood addressed issues concerning international economic cooperation, especially within the framework of the Group of Ten nations and the International Monetary Fund. During this period, the main areas of concern included the balance of payments deficit, international reserves and liquidity, and exchange rate flexibility, which Wood addressed in numerous reports and articles during this time.
Wood retired from the Federal Reserve in 1973, and died on March 8, 1994 in Fairfax, Virginia.
The Ralph C. Wood Papers are divided into three series, which are arranged in chronological order:
· Early Chronological Files (1931-1953, ca. 0.6 linear foot): These files begin with Wood’s freshman year at Wesleyan, and initially contain mostly correspondence with friends and family. Later correspondence reflect his areas of graduate research, as well as his activities with the WPA, the Department of Commerce, and his work with the Marshall Plan in France.
· Federal Reserve Board of Governors (1955-1973, ca. 2.3 linear feet): The bulk of the collection, these files document Wood’s activities within the Federal Reserve, especially through memoranda and extensive reports on the issues of importance before the Division of International Finance.
· Miscellaneous and printed material (1947-1992, ca. 0.8 linear foot): This series contains papers written by Wood in his retirement, news clippings, and publications from organizations such as the Federal Reserve, the Organization for European Economic Cooperation, and the International Monetary Fund which Wood kept for their reference value.
RALPH C. WOOD PAPERS
Box and Folder Inventory
BOX CONTENTS
1
EARLY CHRONOLOGICAL FILE
1931
January-May
June-December
1932
1933
January-June
July-December
1934
January-June
July-December
1935
2
1936
1938
1939
1941
1941-45
1946
1947
1948
1949-50
1951-53
FEDERAL RESERVE SYSTEM
1951-53
1955
FEDERAL RESERVE BOARD OF GOVERNORS
1956-57
1958
January-July
August-September
3
1959
1960
January-April
May-June
July-December
1961
January-May
June-December
1962
1963
1964
January-June
July-December
4
1965
January-April
May
June-September
October
November-December
5
1966
January-March
April-June
July-December
1967
January-July
August-December
1968
January-March
April-June
6
July—December
1969
January-July
August-December
1970
January-May
June-October
November-December
7
1971
January-April
May-August
September-December
1972
January-March
April-August
September-December
1973
1980
1981
1991-92, clippings
8
Publications
9
Publications