John Hall, a trustee for Vanderbilt University since 1987, graduated magna cum laude with an engineering degree from Vanderbilt in 1955. He was co-captain of the 1954 football team and was named Academic All-American. Hall continues to use the same leadership skills he developed as a Vanderbilt football captain, and as chair and CEO of Ashland Inc.; preferring to stress teamwork and crediting others for the accomplishments made during his four-year tenure as chairman of the Vanderbilt Board of Trust.
After serving in the military and spending a short period with Exxon Corporation, he joined Ashland Inc. in 1957 as a chemical engineer. He became a vice president in 1966, a director in 1968, and president of Ashland Chemical Company in 1971. In 1974, he was elected executive vice president of Ashland. In September of 1981, he was elected Chairman and CEO.
He retired from the position of CEO in 1996 and from the position of Chairman of the Board 1997. Hall is a member of the Vanderbilt School of Engineering Committee of Visitors and serves on the board of curators of Transylvania University. He is chairman of the Commonwealth Fund for Kentucky Education Television, the Blue Grass Community Foundation, and a past chairman of Leadership Kentucky. He is a past chairman and counselor-for-life of The Conference Board. He served as Kentucky’s chairman for the U.S. Olympic Committee from 1987 to 1997. He also served as chairman of the Vanderbilt Board of Trust from 1995 to 1999.
He was elected to the Verizon Academic All-America Hall of Fame in 2001. Hall has dedicated much of his professional life to improving education both regionally and nationally. As co-chairman of the steering committee of the Partnership for Kentucky School Reform, he was a leading advocate for improving the state’s elementary and secondary schools. He also chaired the West Virginia Business and Education Alliance.
As Chairman and CEO of Ashland, Hall devoted the company’s corporate advertising exclusively to promote quality education in the states where the company had major operations.
In 1988, Ashland’s corporate advertising programs earned a Presidential Citation for private sector initiatives. As member of the Business Roundtable, Hall attended a national education summit in Palisades, N.Y. That summit concluded with a historic agreement by the nation’s governors and corporate leaders to set state or local academic standards and hold public schools accountable for meeting them.