Harrison Ford ’64’s Ripon College connection celebrated on Star Wars Day
In honor of the fan-celebrated Star Wars Day on May 4, Chicago native and Ripon College alumnus Harrison Ford ’64 was profiled in The Bozho, a Madison, Wisconsin-based online publication.
“Happy Star Wars Day! Han Solo lived in Wisconsin” chronicles how Ford started acting at Ripon College, took a job in summer stock theatre soon after, and supplemented his income with carpentry.
“As legend has it, Ford was building a door at Francis Ford Coppola’s office when he ran into George Lucas, his American Graffiti director a few years earlier, who now was casting a new science fiction film,” the article states.
“Seeing as Ford was an actor, Lucas would frequently pull him away from his carpenter duties to sit in on auditions for the film, often reading the part of a galactic smuggler named ‘Han Solo.’ And the rest, as they say, is history.”
The entire article can be read here.
Ford majored in philosophy at Ripon College.
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