Arthur M. Wood Family Collection

Pauline Palmer Wood was the daughter of Pauline Kohlsaat and Potter Palmer, Jr. of Chicago; her brother was Potter Palmer III. She was the granddaughter of Bertha Honoree and Potter Palmer, Chicago leaders in the last third of the nineteenth century. Like her sister, Bertha, Wood attended Concord Academy. After European travel and World War II, she married Arthur MacDougall Wood (1913-2005) on November 17, 1945. She had two children: Pauline Palmer Wood Egan (b. 1948) and Arthur M. Wood, Jr. (b. 1950). Wood was active in the Chicago Historical Society and the Lake Forest Garden Club.

Arthur MacDougall Wood was the son of R. Arthur Wood and Emily Smith Wood of Highland Park. In 1931 R. Arthur Wood had been president of the Chicago Stock Exchange. Wood graduated from Princeton in 1934 and from Harvard Law in 1937. After brief practice as an attorney in Chicago, Wood entered the military during World War II. After returning from military service, he joined Sears Roebuck & Co., Chicago, and rose to lead this major international company in the 1970s. Wood also participated in many high-profile national leadership roles as one of the country's key corporate heads. After his retirement in 1978 he served as president of the Art Institute of Chicago.

The family lived in the former Hugh McBirney Johnston/A.B. Dick, Jr. house on North Green Bay Road, Lake Forest, now occupied by Arthur M. Wood, Jr. and his family.