Harrison Ford Worked as Carpenter to Feed Family of 4 — After Huge Fame, He Still Works in the Woodshop on His Ranch

Harrison Ford is one of Hollywood’s icons with several legendary leading roles in some of the best movies in the industry. Ford is a Chicago-born actor from Illinois. His mother, Dorothy, was a homemaker, and his father, Christopher, was an advertising executive.

The actor did not have much to say about his childhood; he described it as “relatively uneventful, middle-class – but a happy time nonetheless.” He graduated high school in 1960 and went to college to study English and Philosophy at Ripon College in Wisconsin.

Ford’s time in college accidentally exposed him to acting. He decided to sign up for a drama class, thinking it would be an easy way to get good grades. He was nervous about performing in front of a crowd, but he loved the storytelling part of it.

Though Ford had found something he enjoyed in college, he was not the best student, so he left the university before graduating and decided to build his acting career independently. But the road was difficult, so he became a carpenter while scraping for acting roles.

“Through carpentry, I fed my family,” revealed Ford, whose job as a carpenter allowed him to sieve through the acting roles that came his way and patiently wait for his breakthrough role.

However, Ford admitted that the waiting started to become frustrating. Regardless, he never gave up on his ambition to become a successful actor and did not let the stress distract him from achieving his goal.

Ford was one of the founding actors of the “Star Wars” franchise. But there is a story behind how he landed his iconic role in the trilogy. Ford and the creator of “Star Wars,” George Lucas, had two different versions of how Ford was cast to play Han Solo.

Lucas, who previously directed “American Graffiti,” had cast Ford for a minor role. While creating a list of actors to include in “Star Wars,” he swore not to bring anyone...