Elizabeth Anne "Betty" Ford (nÃÆ' Â © eÃ, Bloomer <8 April 1918 - July 8, 2011) was the First Lady of the United States from 1974 to 1977, as the wife of the President of America United 38th, Gerald Ford. As First Lady, she is active in social policy and creates a precedent as politically active presidential wife. Ford also served as the Second Lady of the United States from 1973 to 1974.
During her husband's tenure at office, she maintained a high level of approval despite being opposed by some conservative Republicans who objected to her more moderate and liberal position in social affairs. Ford is famous for raising awareness of breast cancer after his 1974 mastectomy. In addition, he is a staunch supporter and activist for, Equal Rights Amendment (ERA). Pro-choice about abortion and leader in the Women's Movement, she gained fame as one of the first honest women in history, commenting on any hot button issues at the time, including feminism, equal payments, Equal Rights Amendment, sex, drugs, abortion, and gun control. He also raised awareness of addiction when in the 1970s, he announced his long fight with alcoholism and substance abuse, becoming the first First Lady to do so.
After years of the White House, he continues to lobby for the ERA and remain active in the feminist movement. He is the founder, and served as chairman of the board of directors first, from Betty Ford Center for substance abuse and addiction. He was awarded the Gold Medal of Congress (a joint presentation with her husband on October 21, 1998) and the Presidential Medal of Freedom (presented 1991 by George H. W. Bush).
Video Betty Ford
Early life and career
Ford was born to Elizabeth Anne Bloomer in 1918 in Chicago, Illinois, the third and only child of Hortense (nÃÆ' Â © e Neahr; 1884 - 1948) and William Stephenson Bloomer, Sr. (1874 - 1934), who was a traveling salesman for Royal Rubber Co. She was called Betty as a child.
Hortense and William married on November 9, 1904 in Chicago. Two of Betty's older brothers were Robert (1971) and William Jr. After the family lived briefly in Denver, Colorado, he grew up in Grand Rapids, Michigan, where he graduated from High School.
After the stock market crash of 1929, when Bloomer was 11 years old, he started earning money by modeling clothes and teaching popular dance kids, such as foxtrot, waltz, and big apples. She also entertains and works with handicapped children at Mary's Sleep Free Home for Crippled Kids. She studied dancing at Calla Travis Dance Studio, graduating in 1935.
When Betty Bloomer was 16, her father died of carbon monoxide poisoning in the family garage while working under their car, even though the garage door was open. He died the day before his 60th birthday.
In 1936, after Bloomer graduated from high school, he proposed to continue his studies dancing in New York City, but his mother refused. Instead, he attended Bennington School of Dance in Bennington, Vermont, for two summers, where he studied under the director Martha Hill with choreographers Martha Graham and Just Holm. After being accepted by Graham as a student, Bloomer moved to New York City to live in the Chelsea Chelsea neighborhood; he worked as a fashion model for John Robert Powers company to finance dance studies. He joined the auxiliary group of Graham and eventually performed with the company at Carnegie Hall in New York City.
Her mother opposed her daughter's choice of career and insisted that she move to the house, but Bloomer refused. Finally they come to a compromise: Bloomer has to return home for six months, but if he still wants to return to New York City at the end of that time, his mother will not protest any further. Bloomer became immersed in his life in Grand Rapids and did not return to New York. Her mother remarried, with family friends and neighbors, Arthur Meigs Goodwin, and Bloomer living with them. He got a job as assistant fashion coordinator for Herpolsheimer's, a local department store. He also organizes his own dance groups and teaches dance at various sites in Grand Rapids.
Maps Betty Ford
Marriage and family
In 1942, Elizabeth Bloomer married William G. Warren, who worked for her father in insurance sales, and whom she had known since she was 12 years old. William Warren started selling insurance to other companies soon after their marriage. He then worked for Continental Can Co., and afterwards for Widdicomb Furniture. The couple often moved because of her job. At one point, they lived in Toledo, Ohio, where Elizabeth was employed at the department store Lasalle & amp; Koch as a demonstrator, a job that requires being a model and a salesperson. He works on a production line for a frozen food company in Fulton, New York. When they returned to Grand Rapids, he worked again at Herpolsheimer's, this time as " The " Fashion Coordinator. Warren is an alcoholic and his health is bad. Just after Betty decided to file for divorce, she went into a coma. She took care of her for two years when she recovered, at her family's home. She stays on top while she is cared for below. After he recovered, they divorced on September 22, 1947.
On October 15, 1948, Elizabeth married Gerald Ford, a lawyer and veteran of World War II, at Grace Episcopal Church, in Grand Rapids. Gerald Ford then campaigned for what would be the first of his thirteen terms as a member of the US House of Representatives. In his first adjustment to politics, he asked him to postpone marriage shortly before the election because, as the New York Times reported, "Jerry runs for Congress and is not sure how the electorate might feel about him marrying a divorced dancer."
Gerald and Elizabeth Ford had four children: Michael Gerald Ford (born 1950), John Gardner Ford (nicknamed Jack, born 1952), Steven Meigs Ford (born 1956), and Susan Elizabeth Ford (born 1957). Betty Ford never hit or beat his children, believing that there is a better and more constructive way to handle discipline and punishment.
Ford moved to the Virginia suburb of Washington, D.C., and lived there for twenty-five years. Gerald Ford rose to Republican with the highest ranking in the House. After Spiro Agnew resigned as Vice President in 1973, President Richard Nixon appointed Gerald Ford to that position. He succeeded in becoming president in 1974, following Nixon's resignation behind the Watergate scandal.
The Fords, who married for 58 years until Gerald's death, were among the more open First Couples in the history of the United States. No one is ashamed of mutual love and respect, and they are known to have strong personal and political partnerships.
First Lady of the United States
Strength, influence and national openness
Journalists wondered what the first Ford woman looked like, because they thought her predecessor, Pat Nixon, as one reporter noted, to be "the most disciplined and historically organized woman first." In the opinion of The New York Times and some presidential historians, "Mrs. Ford's influence on American culture may be far wider and more lasting than her husband, who served only 896 days, much of it spent trying to restore the dignity of the office president. "
Steinhauer of The New York Times described Ford as "a product and symbol of a cultural and political period - performing Bump dance along the White House corridor, wearing a mood ring, chatting on his CB, a radio with a handle First Mamaà ¢ â, ¬ â "¢ - a housewife who persistently orchestrates equal rights for women, the mother of four people who think about drugs, abortion and premarital sex loudly and without regret." In the year 1975, in an interview with McCall's , Ford said that he was asked about everything, except how often he and the president had sex. "And if they ask me I will tell them," he said, adding that the answer was, "As often as possible."
He is open about the benefits of psychiatric care, and talks with the understanding of the use of marijuana and premarital sex. The First Lady noted during a televised White House tour that she and the President shared the same bed. Ford was a guest at 60 Minutes and, in a very open interview, he discussed how he would advise his daughter if he was having an affair. He said he "would not be surprised" by it, and also admitted that his children may have experimented with marijuana, which is popular among youngsters. Some conservatives called him "No Lady" for his comments and demanded that he "resign", but his overall approval rating was seventy-five percent high. As he said later, during his failed president's 1976 presidential campaign, "I will give my life for Jerry to have my poll number."
His outspoken comments also caused President Ford's advisors to be anxious for their efforts to restore American tranquility behind Watergate.
Social policy and political activism
During his time as First Lady, Ford was a vocal advocate of women's rights and a prominent force in the 1970s Women's Movement. He supported the proposed ERA and lobbied the state legislatures to ratify the amendments, and took the opposite of the amendment. He also does not have a pro-apology option. His active political role prompted Time to Call him the "First Ladies" of the country and named him Women of the Year in 1975, as a representative of American women, along with other feminist icons.
In May 1975, during a four-day trip, Ford met with former Prime Minister of the Republic of Vietnam, Nguy? N Cao K? to discuss Southeast Asian refugees, Ford later stated that he was impressed with the behavior of the refugees.
On June 30, 1976, Ford attended the opening of "Remember the Ladies", an exhibition of women of the Revolutionary War era. He drew ridicule from demonstrators against the Equal Rights Amendment in stating, "This exhibition of abandoned Americans should give us the strength and courage to seek equal rights for women today."
For a time, it was not clear whether Gerald Ford shared his wife's pro-choice view. In December 1999, he told the Larry King interviewer that he was also a pro-choice and had been criticized for his attitude by the conservative forces within the Republican Party.
Health and breast cancer awareness
A few weeks after Ford became First Lady, she underwent a mastectomy for breast cancer on September 28, 1974, after being diagnosed with the disease. Ford decided to be open about his illness because "There are so many things covered up during Watergate that we want to make sure there will be no accountability in the Ford administration." His openness about cancer and his treatment increases the visibility of the disease that Americans were previously reluctant to talk about.
When other women have the same operation, it does not make headlines, "he told Time. . But the fact that I was the President's wife put her on the headlines and brought to the public this. special experience that I experienced. It makes many women realize that it can happen to them. I'm sure I've saved at least one person - maybe more.
Adding to the increasing public awareness of breast cancer is a report that a few weeks after Ford's cancer surgery, Happy Rockefeller, wife of vice-president Nelson Rockefeller, also underwent a mastectomy. The spike in self-examining women after Ford became public with the diagnosis led to an increase in reported cases of breast cancer, a phenomenon known as "Betty Ford blip".
Art
As First Lady, Ford is an art advocate; He was instrumental in winning the Presidential Medal of Freedom award for choreographer and dancer Martha Graham in 1976. He received an award from Parsons The New School for Design in recognition of his style.
Acknowledging the 1976 election
After the defeat of Gerald Ford by Jimmy Carter in the 1976 presidential election he delivered his husband's concession speech because he lost his voice during the campaign.
Post-White House Career
After leaving the White House in 1977, Ford continued to lead an active public life. In addition to establishing the Betty Ford Center, he remains active in women's issues, takes many lectures and lends his name to a charity for fundraising. In March 1977, Ford signed a contract with NBC News to appear in two news specials in the next two years along with contributing to Today and jointly signed a contract with her husband to write their memoirs. In June, Ford became a speaker at the Arthritis Association Convention. In September of that year, Ford went to Moscow to record a television show and serve as a hostess for The Nutcracker. In November, Ford appeared at the opening session of the National Women's Conference in Houston, Texas.
In January 1984, Ford said six years since starting his treatment "are the best years of my life from the point of view of feeling healthier and feeling better about myself" during a speech at a program in Michigan.
Betty Ford Center
In 1978, the Ford family intervened and forced him to face alcoholism and opioid analgesic addiction, which had been prescribed in the early 1960s for a pinched nerve. "I like alcohol," he wrote in his 1987 memoir. "It makes me feel warm, and I like pills, they take my tension and my pain". She was being treated for substance abuse.
In 1982, after healed, he founded the Betty Ford Center (originally named Betty Ford Clinic) in Rancho Mirage, California, for chemical dependency treatments, including treating alcoholic children. He served as chairman of the board of directors. He also co-authored Chris Chase with a book about his care, Betty: A Glad Awakening (1987). In 2003, Ford produced another book, Healing and Hope: Six Women from the Betty Ford Center Share Their Forced Travel Addiction and Recovery . In 2005, Ford released the seat of its central board of directors to his daughter, Susan. He has held the top position at the center since it was founded.
Barbara Bush, one of Ford's successors as First Lady, observes that Ford, having found him dependent on drugs, "turns his pain into something great for the common good, because he suffers, there will be more healing. there's more joy. "
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Ford continued to be an active leader and feminist movement activist after the Ford administration. He continues to advocate and lobby state politicians and legislatures to pass the ERA. In 1977, President Jimmy Carter appointed Ford to the second National Commission on Observations of the International Women's Year (the first of which had been designated by President Ford). In the same year, he joined First Ladies Lady Bird Johnson and Rosalynn Carter to open and participate in the National Women's Conference in Houston, Texas, where he supported the steps in the National Action Plan of the Convention, a report sent to the state legislature section, the US Congress, and the President on how to improve the status of American women. Ford continues to be a vocal supporter with the same pay for women, breast cancer awareness, and ERA throughout his life.
In 1978, the deadline for ratification of the ERA was extended from 1979 to 1982, most of which resulted from a hundred thousand people march on Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington. The march was led by leading feminist leaders, including Ford, Bella Abzug, Elizabeth Chittick, Betty Friedan, and Gloria Steinem. In 1981, Eleanor Smeal, National Organization for Women's Presidents, announced the appointment of Ford to become chairman together, with Alan Alda, from the ERA Counting Campaign. In November 1981, Ford stated that Illinois Governor James R. Thompson had not been sufficiently supportive of the ERA and his disappointment with First Lady Nancy Reagan did not support the move, although she also expressed her hope to change the First Lady Mind petah in a further meeting with her. As the deadline approached, Ford led parades and demonstrations for the ERA with other feminists, including First Princess Maureen Reagan and various Hollywood actors. Ford is credited with rejuvenating the ERA movement and inspiring more women to continue working for the ERA. He visited countries, including Illinois, where ratification is believed to have the most realistic chance of passing. The amendment does not accept sufficient state ratification. In 2004, Ford reaffirmed its pro-choice stance and its support for the 1973 US Supreme Court decision at Roe v. Wade, as well as his confidence and support for the ratification of the ERA.
Life and honor later
In 1987, Ford underwent fourfold coronary bypass surgery and recovered without complications.
On November 18, 1991, he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President George H.W. Bush and the Gold Medal of Congress in 1999. That same year, the Golden Palm Star at the Palm Springs Walk of Stars was dedicated to her and her husband.
On May 8, 2003, Ford received the Woodrow Wilson Award in Los Angeles for its public services, provided by the Woodrow Wilson Center of the Smithsonian Institution.
During these years, she and her husband live in Rancho Mirage and in Beaver Creek, Colorado. Gerald Ford died, aged 93, heart failure on December 26, 2006 at their Rancho Mirage home. Despite his advanced age and poor physical condition, Ford traveled throughout the country and took part in funerals in California, Washington, D.C., and Michigan.
After the death of her husband, Ford continues to live in Rancho Mirage. Poor health and brittleness due to surgery in August 2006 and April 2007 because blood clots in his legs caused him to severely limit his public life. Her poor health prevented her from attending Lady Bird Johnson's funeral in July 2007; her daughter, Susan Ford, representing her mother at a funeral.
Death and burial
Betty Ford died of natural causes on July 8, 2011, three months after her 93rd birthday, at Eisenhower Medical Center in Rancho Mirage. Coincidentally, she and her husband, Gerald Ford, were both 93 years old when they died; Gerald's life is 74 days longer than Betty.
The funeral service was held in Palm Desert, California, on July 12, 2011, with over 800 people present, including former president George W. Bush, then-First Lady Michelle Obama, then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, former First Lady Rosalynn Carter and former First Lady Nancy Reagan.
On July 13, the flight was flown to Grand Rapids where he lay at the Gerald Ford Museum overnight.
On July 14, a second service was held at Grace Episcopal Church with a speech of praise given by Lynne Cheney, former director of Ford Museum Richard Norton Smith, and son of Ford Steven. Present were former president Bill Clinton, former vice-president Dick Cheney and former first lady Barbara Bush. In his speech, Ny. Cheney notes that July 14 will be Gerald Ford's 98th birthday. After the service, he was buried beside her husband in the museum yard.
Awards
In 1985, Ford received the Award for the Greatest Unprofitable Profitable, Profitable Service awarded annually by the Jefferson Awards.
Bibliography
- Ford, Betty; Chase, Chris (1978). The Times of My Life . New York City, New York: Harper & amp; Line. ISBN 978-0-06-011298-1. CS1 maint: Many names: list of authors (links)
- Ford, Betty; Chase, Chris (1987). Betty - A Glad Awakening . Garden City, New York: Doubleday. ISBN: 978-0-385-23502-0. < span> CS1 maint: Many names: list of authors (links)
- Ford, Betty; Betty Ford Center (2003). Healing and Hope - Six Women from Betty Ford Center Share Their Forced Travel Addiction and Recovery . New York City, New York: Putnam (Penguin Group). ISBN: 978-0-399-15138-5.
See also
- List of breast cancer patients by job
- First Woman List in United States
- Second wave feminism
Note
External links
- Betty Ford, Visual History curated by Michigan State University
- Betty Ford, First Lady of US Presidents at Discovering the Mausoleum
- Betty Ford on IMDb
- Given Betty FordÃ, - a slideshow by Life
- Ford, Betty from EncyclopÃÆ'Â|dia Britannica
- Appearance in C-SPAN
- Betty Ford in C-SPAN First Ladies: Influence & amp; Images
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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