Biography | Jim Farley — An Economics Degree Under Healy Tower

People assume a car-company chief studied engineering first.

Farley left Georgetown with a bachelor's degree in economics.

The College of Arts & Sciences records James D. Farley Jr. as C'85.

His father, James D. Farley, had taken a School of Foreign Service degree in 1950.

Ford's official biography still lists the economics bachelor's before the UCLA MBA.

Healy Hall is the building a visitor actually sees.

Smithmeyer and Pelz finished the tower in 1879 as the college's flagship.

It is a National Historic Landmark, with Gaston Hall and Riggs Library inside.

The lawn in front of it is the public ground of the Hilltop.

Farley later told the college that the work of the industry, not only the cars, was the problem he wanted.

That later interview is not this pin.

The fact that stands here is simpler.

An economics degree from this campus preceded twenty years at Toyota and then Ford.

Toyota took him into strategic planning in 1990, then product and marketing posts in the United States and Europe.

Lexus and the Scion launch came from that track, not from a Dearborn apprenticeship.

From Healy Lawn the next documented school is Los Angeles and an Anderson MBA in 1990.

Do not confuse this pin with a private classroom or a current office.

Stand on the lawn and look at the tower.

That is as close as the pilgrimage should come.

Photo: Warren LeMay, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons