Ford S. Worthy

Ford S. Worthy spent his formative professional years as a journalist, took a brief detour as a corporate securities lawyer, and then focused his career in biotech venture capital. At every stage, he has been drawn to the art and challenge of finding things – most often people who were hidden from sight and sometimes didn’t want to be found, but also the hidden financial truths frequently embedded in prosaic income statements and balance sheets. In Search of a Boy Named Chester, the story of his quest to find out what became of a young boy whom his father briefly encountered in 1945, is his first book. Kirkus Reviews described it as "a genealogical detective story" that "is ultimately a celebration of the lives we all lead."

A longtime North

Ford S. Worthy spent his formative professional years as a journalist, took a brief detour as a corporate securities lawyer, and then focused his career in biotech venture capital. At every stage, he has been drawn to the art and challenge of finding things – most often people who were hidden from sight and sometimes didn’t want to be found, but also the hidden financial truths frequently embedded in prosaic income statements and balance sheets. In Search of a Boy Named Chester, the story of his quest to find out what became of a young boy whom his father briefly encountered in 1945, is his first book. Kirkus Reviews described it as "a genealogical detective story" that "is ultimately a celebration of the lives we all lead."

A longtime North Carolinian, Ford was born in Charlotte, grew up in Raleigh and attended the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Interdisciplinary Studies. He worked as a researcher and writer for Fortune magazine in New York and later served as the magazine’s bureau chief in Chicago and Hong Kong. His article “The Coming Defaults in Junk Bonds” was selected as a finalist for the National Magazine Award in 1988. He authored or co-authored stories about the fugitive commodities trader Marc Rich, the intensely private Pritzker family of Chicago, and the arms dealer Adnan Khashoggi. Following his time at Fortune, he earned a law degree from the University of Chicago, where he was a member of the University of Chicago Law Review. He worked as an attorney in Raleigh before joining Pappas Capital, a biotech venture capital firm in Durham. He has served as a partner, and now senior advisor, at Pappas Capital since 1997, and is a senior advisor and board member for North Carolina Longform Magazine, publisher of The Assembly. He and his wife Allison live in Chapel Hill.