Health and breast cancer awareness
Weeks after Ford became First Lady; she underwent a
mastectomy for breast cancer on September 28, 1974, after having been diagnosed
with the disease. Ford decided to be open about her illness because "There had been so many cover-ups
during Watergate that we wanted to be sure there would be no cover-up in the
Ford administration." Her openness about her cancer and treatment
raised the visibility of a disease that Americans had previously been reluctant
to talk about.
"When other women
have this same operation, it doesn't make any headlines," she told
Time. "But the fact that I was the
wife of the President put it in the headlines and brought before the public this
particular experience I was going through. It made a lot of women realize that
it could happen to them. I'm sure I've saved at least one person—maybe
more."
Adding to heightened public awareness of breast cancer were
reports that several weeks after Ford's cancer surgery, Happy Rockefeller, the
wife of Vice President Nelson
Rockefeller, also had a mastectomy. The spike in women self-examining after
Ford went public with the diagnosis led to an increase in reported cases of
breast cancer, a phenomenon known as the "Betty
Ford blip".
According to Tasha N.
Dubriwny, the massive media coverage of Ford's mastectomy was constrained
by stereotypical gender roles, particularly the need for breast cancer patients
to maintain their femininity. Betty Ford was portrayed as an ideal patient
within a success narrative that presented the key sequences of her breast
cancer diagnosis and treatment in a progressive, linear fashion that inspired
optimism. Her coverage minimized the complexity of breast cancer as a disease
and ignored the debates surrounding best treatment practices. It amounted to an
aestheticization of breast cancer and her coverage became the major discursive
model for looking at all breast cancer survivors.
After her mastectomy, Ford received chemotherapy treatments
and saw regular checkups. White House Physician William M. Lukash claimed in a March 1975 statement that Ford was
suffering no side effects from her chemotherapy.
In March 1975, Ford temporarily cut back her schedule after
suffering a flareup of her chronic arthritis.
The arts
As First Lady, Ford was an advocate of the arts. She
successfully lobbied her husband to award the Presidential Medal of Freedom to
choreographer and dancer Martha Graham in 1976. She received an award from
Parsons The New School for Design in recognition of her style.
State dinners
Despite the brevity of her husband's presidency (roughly two
and a half years), he hosted 33 state dinners, the fifth most state dinners of any
United States president. The first of these came only a week into Ford's
presidency, hosting King Hussein of
Jordan on August 16, 1974. Once she became First Lady, it fell to Ford to
arrange this already-scheduled dinner. She found out about this upcoming dinner
and her responsibility for planning it through a phone call she received within 24 hours after her husband's swearing-in as president. As previously mentioned,
the Fords had hosted a state dinner for King Hussein months earlier, during Gerald Ford's vice presidency, on March
12, 1974, after President Nixon asked then-Vice President Ford to take over for
him in hosting a planned dinner for the King. At the first state dinner that
she arranged as First Lady, Ford revived dancing as an activity of White House
state dinners. The Nixons had previously removed dancing from the state dinners
during Nixon's presidency. At the state dinners of the Ford presidency, the
president and First Lady always led off the dancing, and dancing often lasted
beyond midnight.
The Fords opted to have an eclectic array of guests at their
state dinners, including notable celebrities from the entertainment industry.
The Fords' children often also attended the dinners they hosted.
During their final year in the White House, the Fords hosted
eleven state dinners. This large number of state dinners was, in part, due to
great interest from foreign dignitaries in visiting the United States for a
state dinner amid the United States bicentennial celebrations. Ford made the
decision that year to erect a tent in the White House Rose Garden to host
dinners outside. For state dinners held using this tent, the receptions,
entertainment, and dancing portions of the evenings were still held inside the White House.
Among the most notable state dinners the Fords hosted was a
July 7, 1976 state dinner honoring Queen
Elizabeth II and Prince Philip, the
Duke of Edinburgh. This dinner was part of the American bicentennial
celebrations and was held in a tent on the South Lawn of the White House.
Dishes that Ford particularly liked serving at state dinners
included wild rice, Columbia River salmon, soufflé, and flambé. The state
dinners that Ford planned as First Lady made a deliberate effort to showcase
American ingredients. By late 1974, Ford had shifted to exclusively serving
wine that was American-cultivated at state dinners. The November 12, 1974 state
dinner for Austrian Chancellor Bruno
Kreisky saw the first instance in which a wine from the Fords' home state
of Michigan was served at a White House state dinner, with wine from the Tabor
Hill Winery being served. It was not until 2016, during the presidency of
Barack Obama, that a Michigan wine would again be served at a White House state
dinner.
Diplomatic trips
Ford accompanied her husband abroad on several diplomatic
trips. Among the nations that Ford accompanied her husband to were China,
Poland, Romania, and Yugoslavia.
Ford did not take any solo trips abroad as First Lady. She
is the most recent First Lady not to have done so. Ford's failure to conduct a
solo trip is not all that extraordinary, however. The first instance of a first
lady conducting one had been Eleanor
Roosevelt in 1942. Ford's recent predecessor Lady Bird Johnson was among other First Ladies who did not conduct
solo trips abroad.
During the Fords' 1976 trip to mainland China, when being
shown an exhibition by a Chinese arts college dance group, Ford decided to join
the dancers. Photos of this moment were published widely in the American press,
resulting in Betty Ford somewhat upstaging President Ford in the press.
Philanthropic causes
Ford supported numerous charities as first lady. Ford
assisted in fundraising for the little-known Hospital for Sick Children in
Washington, D.C., whose patients were predominantly African American. She also
fundraised for No Greater Love, in appreciation of its work benefiting Children
of Vietnam War MIA and POWs. She served as the honorary president of the
National Lupus Foundation, regarding lupus as a disease that impacted women,
yet received minimal public attention. Her philanthropic support additionally
placed a specific focus on charities serving children with special needs.
Role in the 1976
presidential campaign
In November 1975, it was reported by the Associated Press
that Ford's husband's advisors, who had previously worried her outspoken
comments would hurt him in the 1976 presidential election, were now recognizing
her popularity and desiring for her to have a greater role in the campaign.
Ford ultimately played an important role in the 1976 election campaign. Ford
made campaign appearances and delivered speeches across the United States.
Ford was also used, both by Ford supporters and detractors,
as a symbol of liberal Republicanism, with her politics contrasting with the
Republican Party's conservative and moderate wings.
During the campaign, many Ford supporters wore campaign
buttons with phrases like "Betty's
Husband for President in '76" and "Keep
Betty in the White House". The use of Ford in such a manner to promote
her husband's candidacy was not the work of the campaign itself, but rather,
produced by supporters outside of the campaign organization. The campaigns of
the previous three presidents that sought election to an additional term (Dwight D. Eisenhower, Lyndon B. Johnson,
Richard Nixon) had needed to manufacture campaign publicity involving their
First Ladies (Mamie Eisenhower, Lady
Bird Johnson, and Pat Nixon). In contrast, there was tremendous organic
excitement for Betty Ford among
supporters of the campaign.
Ford campaigned actively both during primary elections and
the general election. A contrast was publicly drawn between Ford and Nancy Reagan, the wife of Ford's
primary election challenger Ronald
Reagan. Reagan had contrasting views on issues such as drug experimentation
by teenagers and the Equal Rights Amendment (which she opposed passing). Many
of Ford's views were aligned with, or even more liberal than, Rosalyn Carter, the wife of Ford's
Democratic general election opponent Jimmy Carter.
During the primaries, Ford recorded radio advertisements on
behalf of the campaign that were broadcast in New Hampshire. She also traveled
to Iowa before its caucus and delivered a speech on behalf of the president
(who had been unable to make his planned appearance) in which she labeled
herself as being his political partner. The campaign made a deliberate effort,
ahead of the 1976 Republican National Convention, to send Ford to liberal
and moderate-leaning states and not more conservative states in the western and
southern United States.
Between Labor Day and election day, for the general election
campaign, Ford conducted multi-stop speaking tours, during which she visited
western states (including California, Colorado, Texas, and Utah) as well as
northern Midwest states including Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin.
The heavy campaigning placed a strain on Ford's health.
During the general election, her busy campaign activity saw the reigniting of
her pinched nerve. However, even after this, Ford continued with her planned
campaign schedule.
After Gerald Ford's defeat by Jimmy Carter in the 1976 presidential election, she delivered her
husband's concession speech because he had lost his voice while campaigning.
The speech was delivered on the day after the election. This is the only time
that a major United States presidential candidate's spouse has delivered their
concession on their behalf.
After her husband's narrow defeat, there was some anecdotal
speculation that Ford may have both helped to alienate conservative
Republicans from voting for her husband and at the same time helped attract him
support from liberal and moderate Republicans, Democrats, and independents.
Departure from the
White House
During the period after the election, Ford postponed
scheduled plans to give her slated successor, Rosalyn Carter, a tour of the White House. Unknown to Carter at the
time, this was likely due to Ford's fragility caused by her prescription drug
abuse. When Ford attempted to postpone the plans a second time, President-elect
Carter called the White House and threatened to make a fuss in the news if the
tour was not held as planned. Ford capitulated and gave a brief, but cordial,
tour of the White House to Rosalyn
Carter on November 22, 1976, coinciding with President-elect Carter's White
House meeting with President Ford.
On January 19, 1977, her last full day as first lady, Betty
Ford used her training as a Martha
Graham dancer to jump up on the Cabinet Room table. White House
photographer David Hume Kennerly
took a photo of her on the table. Gerald
Ford did not know about or see the photo until 1994. A Ford family friend
said that President Ford "about fell
off his chair" when he saw the photo for the first time. The photo was
subsequently published and is regarded as an "iconic" photograph of Ford's time as First Lady.
Kennerly has touted the image as both capturing Ford's personality and being a
symbolic image showing the feminist First Lady posing in what had been a space
occupied predominantly by white men.
Post–White House life
and career
After leaving the White House in 1977, Ford continued to
lead an active public life. In addition to founding the Betty Ford Center, she
remained active in women's issues, taking on numerous speaking engagements and
lending her name to charities for fundraising.[80] Many of Ford's most
significant contributions as an activist came following the Fords' departure
from the White House.
In March 1977, Ford signed with NBC News to appear in two
news specials within the following two years along with contributing to Today,
and jointly signed with her husband to write their memoirs. In June 1977, Ford
was a speaker at the Arthritis Association Convention. In September of that
year, Ford traveled to Moscow for a television program taping and to serve as
hostess for The Nutcracker. In November 1977, Ford appeared at the opening
session of the National Women's Conference in Houston, Texas.
Recovery from
alcoholism and prescription drug addiction
Ford had suffered from a dependency on prescription
medication and from alcoholism before her husband's presidency. Ford
had, particularly, become addicted to prescription medication (opioid
analgesics) that she had been originally prescribed in the early 1960s to treat
a pinched nerve. Ford took doses of this medication over her
prescription. In her 1987 memoir, she reflected on these addictions, writing, "I liked alcohol, it made me feel
warm. And I loved pills. They took away my tension and my pain". The
fact that Ford had, for years, been given tranquilizers to treat a pinched
nerve in her neck, was public knowledge as far back as her time as Second Lady.
During her time as First Lady, there had even been some speculation about
substance abuse by friends and members of the press who observed occasional
slurred speech from Ford. After they left the White House, her addictions
became more evident to her family and appeared life-threatening. On April 1,
1978, her family staged an intervention. To be at Betty Ford's
intervention, President Ford had made last-minute cancellations of numerous
appearances he had been scheduled to take on the East Coast by citing "personal and family reasons".
The intervention forced Betty Ford
to acknowledge the negative impact that her addiction was having on her health
and family relationships. She agreed, that day, to detox from her medicine. She
also ultimately agreed to attend rehab at the Naval Regional Medical Center in
Long Beach, California. Ford succeeded in getting sober. Ford registered
herself at the hospital on April 11, 1978.
As she had previously been with her breast cancer diagnosis
and treatment, Ford was transparent with the public about her addictions and
admittance to rehab. Ford's transparency was praised by experts in drug abuse
treatment, who predicted that it would make a major and positive impact. The
week she entered rehab, Ford disclosed her addiction to prescription
medication. Days later, Ford also disclosed to the public that she had come to
realize that she was additionally an alcoholic. She disclosed her alcoholism
through a statement that a family spokesman read on her behalf at a press
conference (at which Ford was not herself present) held outside of the
hospital. In this statement, Ford disclosed, "I have found I am not only addicted to the medication I have been
taking for my arthritis but also to alcohol". In this statement, she
also praised the reputation of the hospital's addiction treatment program and
declared her pleasure to have the opportunity to attend the treatment. The
statement also declared, "I expect
this treatment and fellowship to be a solution for my problems. I embrace it,
not only for me but all the many others who are here to participate."
The Washington Post reported that Ford's disclosure of alcoholism came as a
surprise to several Ford's close friends, who had regarded her as merely a
social drinker and were oblivious to her drinking problem.
Ford published her first memoir in 1978, The Times of My
Life, in which she discussed her battle with addiction.
During a January 1984 address in Michigan to a crowd of
individuals who were in the early stages of alcohol and drug dependency
treatment, Ford declared that the six years since she began her treatment for
alcohol and drug abuse, "have been
the best years in my life from the standpoint of feeling healthier and feeling
more comfortable with myself".
The Betty Ford Center
In 1982, after recovering from her own addictions, Ford
established the Betty Ford Center (initially called the Betty Ford Clinic) in
Rancho Mirage, California, for the treatment of chemical dependency, including
treating the children of alcoholics. She partnered with her friend Ambassador Leonard Firestone to found it. She
served as chair of the board of directors. She also co-authored with Chris
Chase a book about her treatment, Betty: A Glad Awakening (1987). In 2003, Ford
produced another book, Healing, and Hope: Six Women from the Betty Ford Center
Share Their Powerful Journeys of Addiction and Recovery. In 2005, Ford
relinquished her chair of the center's board of directors to her daughter
Susan. She had held the top post at the center since its founding.
Barbara Bush, a
later First Lady, opined that Ford, after discovering she was dependent on
drugs, "transformed her pain into
something great for the common good. Because she suffered, there will be more
healing. Because of her grief, there will be more joy."
Women's movement
Ford continued to be an active leader and activist in the
feminist movement after the Ford administration. She continued to strongly
advocate and lobby politicians and state legislatures for passage of the ERA.
In 1977, President Jimmy Carter
appointed Ford to the second National Commission on the Observance of
International Women's Year (the first had been appointed by President Ford).
That same year, she joined First Ladies Lady
Bird Johnson and Rosalynn Carter
to open and participate in the National Women's Conference in Houston, Texas,
where she endorsed measures in the convention's National Plan of Action, a
report sent to the state legislatures, the U.S. Congress, and the President on
how to improve the status of American women. Ford continued to be an outspoken
supporter of equal pay for women, breast cancer awareness, and the ERA
throughout her life. She was an active member of the Junior League.
Ford continued to advocate for the ratification of the ERA.
In November 1977, Ford and First Lady Rosalynn Carter joined together to
advocate for its ratification at the National Women's Conference in Houston. In
1978, the deadline for ratification of the ERA was extended from 1979 to 1982,
resulting largely from a march of a hundred thousand people on Pennsylvania
Avenue in Washington. The march was led by prominent feminist leaders,
including Ford, Bella Abzug, Elizabeth
Chittick, Betty Friedan, and Gloria
Steinem. In 1981, Eleanor Smeal,
the National Organization for Women's president, announced Ford's appointment
to be the co-chair, with Alan Alda, of the ERA Countdown Campaign. In November
1981, Ford stated that Governor of Illinois James R. Thompson had not done enough in support of the ERA as well
as her disappointment with First Lady Nancy
Reagan not being in favor of the measure, though also relayed her hopes to
change the incumbent First Lady's mind in further encounters with her. As the
deadline approached, Ford led marches, parades, and rallies for the ERA with other
feminists, including First Daughter Maureen
Reagan and various Hollywood actors. Ford was credited with rejuvenating
the ERA movement and inspiring more women to continue working for the ERA. She
visited states, including Illinois, where ratification was believed to have the
most realistic chance of passing. On October 12, 1981, Ford spoke in support of
the ERA at a rally held at the National Mall. The amendment did not receive
enough states' ratification. In 2004, Ford reaffirmed her pro-abortion rights
stance and her support for the 1973 U.S. Supreme Court decision in Roe v. Wade, as well as her belief in
and support for the ratification of the ERA.
Other matters
Ford involved herself with the American Cancer Society and
the Arthritis Foundation.
Decades later, in his 2014 memoir, television producer Norman Lear revealed that in the
late-1970s Ford had played a significant role in helping to persuade television
executives to purchase the syndication rights to the series Maude, of which she
was an avid viewer. He wrote that, at his request, Ford had attended the
National Association of Television Program Executives convention and spoke to
executives about her love of the series to help pique their interest in the
series.
Ford tackled the stigmatized issue of HIV/AIDS during the
HIV/AIDS crisis. Through the work she did at the Betty Ford Center, Ford
recognized the link between drug abuse and AIDS. She involved herself in the
Los Angeles AIDS Project. In 1985, Ford received the Los Angeles AIDS Projects "Commitment to Life Award".
Her acceptance speech spoke hopefully of the prospect that attitudes towards
HIV/AIDS would shift, being de-stigmatized as cancer and alcoholism had (in
part due to her contribution). When she attended the 1992 Republican National Convention,
Ford wore an AIDS ribbon pin.
Ford supported gay and lesbian causes, speaking against
discrimination in the United States military. In 1993, Ford was quoted as
speaking against existing bans on gays serving in the military, remarking,
Constitutionally all citizens have the right to serve their
country as long as they abide by the rules and regulations of military service.
There have been gays and lesbians serving our country for many years. There
haven't been any more problems than there have been in situations like Tailhook
with heterosexuals. I do not believe they should be asked to leave the
military.
In 1985, Ford received the Award for Greatest Public Service
Benefiting the Disadvantaged, an annual award given by the Jefferson Awards.
That same year, Ford received the Golden Plate Award from the American Academy of
Achievement. This was formally presented to her by President Ford, who was an
Academy Awards Council member.[
In 1987, Ford underwent quadruple coronary bypass surgery
and recovered without complications.
In the early 1990s, Ford voiced admiration for First Lady Hillary Clinton and praised her for
taking an active role in policy within her husband's administration by leading
the Clinton healthcare plan
In 1987, Ford was inducted into the Michigan Women's Hall of
Fame. On November 18, 1991, she was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom
by President George H. W. Bush. In
1999, she and President Ford were jointly awarded Congressional Gold Medals.
That same year, a Golden Palm Star on the Palm Springs Walk of Stars was dedicated
to her and her husband. In 2000, the Lasker Foundation awarded Ford its annual
Mary Woodard Lasker Public Service Award. On May 8, 2003, Ford received the
Woodrow Wilson Award in Los Angeles for her public service, awarded by the
Woodrow Wilson Center of the Smithsonian Institution.
During her and President Ford's later years together, they
resided in Rancho Mirage and in Beaver Creek, Colorado. President Ford died,
aged 93, of heart failure on December 26, 2006, at their Rancho Mirage home.
Despite her advanced age and frail physical condition, Ford traveled across
the country and took part in the funeral events in California, Washington,
D.C., and Michigan. Following her husband's death, Ford continued to live in
Rancho Mirage. Poor health and increasing frailty due to operations in August
2006 and April 2007 for blood clots in her legs caused her to largely curtail
her public life. Ill health prevented Ford from attending the funeral of former
First Lady Lady Bird Johnson's in
July 2007, and her daughter Susan Ford
Bales instead represented her at the funeral service.
Death and funeral
Betty Ford died
of natural causes on July 8, 2011, three months after her 93rd birthday, at
Eisenhower Medical Center in Rancho Mirage. Ford left $500,000 for the Betty
Ford Center.
Funeral services were held in Palm Desert, California, on
July 12, 2011, with more than 800 people in attendance, including former
president George W. Bush, then-First
Lady Michelle Obama, then-U.S Secretary
of State Hillary Clinton, herself a
former First Lady, former First Ladies Rosalynn
Carter, who gave a eulogy, and Nancy
Reagan.
On July 14, a second service was held at Grace Episcopal
Church in Grand Rapids, with eulogies given by Lynne Cheney, former Ford Museum director Richard Norton Smith, and Ford's son Steven. In attendance were
former President Bill Clinton,
former Vice President Dick Cheney,
and former First Lady Barbara Bush.
In her remarks, Mrs. Cheney noted that July 14 would have been Gerald Ford's 98th birthday. After the
service, Betty Ford was buried next
to her husband on the museum grounds.
In July 2018, a statue of Ford was unveiled outside of the
Gerald R. Ford Presidential Museum in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
Historical
assessments
According to John
Robert Greene:
Only a part of Betty
Ford's legacy will be that of her role as First Lady. Throughout her
post-Washington life, she established herself as one of the nation's first
public advocates for women's self-examination, a prodigious fund-raiser for
arthritis research, and, most importantly, a tireless campaigner for the rights
and dignity of those afflicted with the disease of substance abuse. Her role as
a public health advocate distinguishes her as one of the most influential women
of the latter part of the twentieth century.
Since 1982 Siena College Research Institute has conducted
occasional surveys asking historians to assess American first ladies according
to a cumulative score on the independent criteria of their background, value to
the country, intelligence, courage, accomplishments, integrity, leadership,
being their own women, public image, and value to the president. Ford has
consistently ranked among the top nine most highly assessed First Ladies in
these surveys. In terms of cumulative assessment, Ford has been ranked:
6th-best of 42 in 1982
9th-best of 37 in 1993
8th-best of 38 in 2003
7th-best of 38 in 2008
6th-best of 39 in 2014
The 2008 Siena Research Institute survey ranked Ford the
5th-highest of the twenty 20th and 21st century First Ladies. The 2008 survey
also ranked Ford the 5th-highest in their assessment of first ladies who were "their own women" as well as the 5th-highest in courage. In both the 1993 and 2003 Siena Research Institute surveys,
Ford was similarly ranked the 5th-highest in historians' assessment of First Ladies'
courage. In the 2014 Siena Research Institute survey, historians ranked Ford
3rd-highest among
20th and 21st century First Ladies in the greatness of post-White
House service, 3rd-highest in the advancement of women's issues, and 4th-highest in
creating a lasting legacy. In the 2014 Siena Research Institute Survey survey,
Ford and her husband were ranked the 19th-highest out of 39 first couples in
terms of being a "power couple".
In 2021, Zogby Analytics conducted a poll in which a sample
of the American public was asked to assess the greatness of twelve First Ladies
from Jacqueline Kennedy onwards. The
American public ranked Ford as the eighth-greatest among these First Ladies.
Cultural depictions
Ford's life is the focus of the 1987 ABC biographical
television film The Betty Ford Story, which has a story adapted from her memoir
The Times of My Life. Gena Rowlands
won both an Emmy Award and a Golden Globe Award for her portrayal of Ford. Ford
is also one of three former First Ladies whose lives are the focus of the
Emmy-nominated 2022 Showtime television series The First Lady, in which she is
portrayed by Kristine Froseth and Michelle Pfeiffer.
Awards and honors
The National Woman's Party presented Ford with a plaque
honoring her as its inaugural "Alice
Paul Award" in the White House's Map Room on January 11, 1977 (the 92nd
birthday of Alice Paul)
In 1975, when Time named "American
women" as its "Time Person
of the Year", the magazine profiled Ford as one of eleven women
selected to represent "American
women".
Other honors and awards include:
1975 National Woman's Party "Alice Paul Award"
1975 Philadelphia Association for Retarded Citizens "Humanitarian Award"
1975 National Art Association "Distinguished Woman of the Year Award"
1975 Anti-Defamation League Women's Division "Rita V. Tishman Human Relations
Award"
1975 Florists' Transworld Delivery "Golden Rose Award"
Order of the Pleiades (awarded in 1975 by Shah Mohammad Reza
Pahlavi of Iran)[
1976 Parsons Annual Critics’ Awards Show "Parsons Award" (an award
given to individuals that, "not only
advance the cause of American fashion but in doing so serve as an inspiration
for students who are about to assume professional and citizenship roles in
American society.")
1978 Eleanor Roosevelt Humanities Award
1981 Friends of Hebrew University "Scopus Award"
1982 American Cancer Society "Hubert Humphrey Inspirational Award"
1983 Susan G. Komen Foundation "Komen Foundation Award"
1984 National Arthritis Foundation "Harding Award"
1985 Jefferson Awards for Public Service "Award for Greatest Public Service
Benefiting the Disadvantaged"
1985 American Academy of Achievement "Golden Plate Award"
1985 AIDS Project Los Angeles "Commitment to Life Award"
1986 National Council on Alcoholism "Golden Key Award"
Inducted into the Michigan Women's Hall of Fame in 1987
1987 International Center for the Disabled "Freedom of Human Spirit Award"
1988 College of Communication at the University of Texas "McGovern Distinguished Leadership
Award"
"Citation of
Layman for Distinguished Service" awarded by the American Medical
Association in 1979
Presidential Medal of Freedom (awarded in 1991 by President
George H. W. Bush)
1991 International Women's Forum "Hall of Fame Award"
1995 Samaritan Institute "National
Samaritan Award"
1995 Columbia Hospital for Women "Breast Cancer Awareness Lifetime Achievement Award"
1995 Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse "Distinguished Service Award"
1996 Bob Hope Classic Ball awardee
1997 American Institute for Public Service "Jefferson Award"
1997 Michigan Women's Foundation "Women of Achievement & Courage" award
1997 Women's International Center "Living Legacy Award"
1998 Common Wealth Award of Distinguished Service
1998 Ronald McDonald House Charities "Award of Excellence"
Congressional Gold Medal in 1999 (jointly awarded to Betty
and Gerald Ford)
Golden Palm Star on the Palm Springs Walk of Stars (jointly
awarded to Betty and Gerald Ford in 1999)
1999 American Hospital Association "C. Everett Koop Health Award"
2000 Lasker Foundation Mary Woodard Lasker Public Service
Award
2003 Smithsonian Institution Woodrow Wilson Center "Woodrow Wilson Award"
National Women's Hall of Fame (inducted posthumously in
2013)
Things and places
named for Ford
Betty Ford Cancer Research Center at Cedars-Sinai Hospital
in Los Angeles, California (named after Ford in 1978)
Betty Ford Center for Comprehensive Breast Diagnosis at
Columbia Hospital for Women in Washington, D.C. (named for Ford in 1980;
hospital now defunct)
Betty Ford Alpine Gardens in Vail, Colorado
Susan G. Komen Foundation "Betty Ford Award" (formerly known as the "Women Foundation Award")
Books Authored
Ford, Betty; Chase, Chris (1978). The Times of My Life. New
York City, New York: Harper & Row. ISBN 978-0-06-011298-1.
Ford, Betty; Chase, Chris (1987). Betty, a Glad Awakening.
Garden City, New York: Doubleday. ISBN 978-0-385-23502-0.
Ford, Betty; Betty Ford Center (2003). Healing and Hope: Six
Women from the Betty Ford Center Share Their Powerful Journeys of Addiction and
Recovery. New York City, New York: Putnam (Penguin Group). ISBN
978-0-399-15138-5.
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