Russ Ford

I was born in 1951 and grew up outside Richmond, Virginia. From my youth I witnessed the segregated South firsthand and the struggles for civil rights and integration. As a college student, I worked summers with underprivileged inner-city youth. The work took me into the poorest neighborhoods in Richmond. In graduate school, I interned and later accepted a Chaplaincy position at a Juvenile Correctional Center. After completing a full-time Clinical Residency in the Patient Counseling Department at The Medical College of Virginia, I began work in Adult Correctional Institutions as a Chaplain. Later I became Director of Chaplains in the Department of Corrections, and I spent over a decade as Chaplain to the condemned men on Virginia's death row.

Teresa (my wife) and I have six grandchildren. We are enjoying our senior years, along with our companion golden retriever, Darwii.