“I can’t say love at first sight”: Biography: This Week, “Betty Ford: One Day at a Time.”
“quite shocked”: TTOML, 47.
Betty was officially and legally divorced: Jerald F. terHorst, “The Makings of Gerald Ford—V: Betty Ford Athletic Too,” Charleston (WV) Gazette, August 29, 1974.
“plunked himself down on the couch”: TTOML, 47.
“I don’t know about you guys”: ibid.
“What are your intentions”: ibid.
“I’m very interested”: ibid.
“Fine . . . I just wanted to find out”: ibid.
“pretty nervy”: ibid., 48.
“I wondered if I was going to ruin everything”: ibid., 47.
Jerry wasn’t very demonstrative: Betty Ford, interview by James Cannon, April 30, 1990, James M. Cannon Research Interviews and Notes, 1989–1994, box 1, Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library, Ann Arbor, MI.
“Betty just lit me up”: Douglas Brinkley, Gerald R. Ford (New York: Times Books, 2007), 13.
“knew darn well he would have a good time”: TTOML, 50.
“silly”: ibid.
“To the light of my life”: ibid.
Bradshaw Crandell: note that in TTOML, Crandell is spelled incorrectly as Crandel, 51–52.
“If you think I’m going to call him up”: ibid., 51.
“Darling, what a surprise!”: ibid., 52.
“At the same time, she was staking out a prior claim”: ibid.
Betty and Jerry had been writing to each other daily: ATTH, 65.
“did you by any chance get a letter”: TTOML, 53.
“It was our big Saturday bash”: ibid., 48.
“I’d like to marry you”: ATTH, 65.
“He didn’t tell me he loved me”: TTOML, 53.
“We can’t get married until next fall”: ibid., 54; also ATTH, 65.
“A fall wedding will be fine”: ATTH, 65.
“Bets darling, Your letter just arrived”: Hortense Bloomer Godwin to Betty Bloomer Warren, letter, April 9, 1948, Gerald and Betty Ford Special Materials Collection, box B2, folder “Godwin, Hortense,” Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library, Ann Arbor, MI.
“it wasn’t that he didn’t trust her”: TerHorst, “Makings of Gerald Ford.”
“I’m going to run for Congress”: TTOML, 54.
She didn’t know what running for Congress meant: ibid., 55.
Only old men go to Congress: ibid.
“it was wild”: ibid.
“campaigning furiously”: ibid.
“He took to campaigning like a starving man to a roast-beef dinner”: ibid.
“I’ve never been in politics”: ibid., 56.
“most particularly because of Jerry’s character”: DeFreest, interview, 5.
“There was no pretense there”: ibid.
“It was exhilarating to be in a race like that”: TTOML, 57.
“We worked our tails off”: Cannon, Gerald R. Ford, 70.
“Like fire and water”: TerHorst, “Makings of Gerald Ford,” 1, 5A.
“What do you think about me marrying Betty?”: ibid.
“Well, I’ve known Betty”: ibid.
“What do you think about Jerry and me?”: ibid.
“Well, Betty,” Jack said, “if you can accept”: ibid.
“You won’t have to worry about other women”: TTOML, 57.
“I loved him for that”: Betty Ford, interview with James Cannon.
“because it was fall . . . we couldn’t miss a Saturday football game”: TTOML, 9.
It was four o’clock, and Jerry had yet to appear: Bonnie Bloomer Baker, discussion, November 11, 2016.
“growing more livid by the moment”: TTOML, 58.
“gave him the devil”: ibid., 59.
“whooping it up”: ibid., 60.
“The thing wasn’t over till midnight”: ibid.
“Oh, Betty . . . I won’t be home for dinner tonight”: ibid., 61; also ATTH, 67.
“Like every woman”: Betty Ford, interview with James Cannon.
PART 2: BETTY FORD, WASHINGTON WOMAN
5: A Congressman’s Wife
“Dear Betty: Your mother is sick”: Arthur Godwin to Betty Ford, letter, November 18, 1948, Gerald and Betty Ford Special Materials Collection, box B2, folder “Godwin, Arthur,” Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library, Ann Arbor, MI.
“She’s gone, honey”: TTOML, 62.
“holding on to one another”: ibid.
“She would not have wanted to live a restricted life”: ibid., 63.
“I believe there’s a meaning for everyone’s coming into this world”: ibid.
was not a political animal”: Biography: This Week, “Betty Ford: One Day at a Time.”
“We were all new together”: TTOML, 65.
“Lyndon . . . I want you to meet this young couple”: ibid., 66.
“Where were you last night?”: ibid., 64.
“adjustment”: ibid., 68.
“Oh, Mrs. Truman, it’s so nice of you to have us”: ibid., 66.
“Heavens, it’s you who are nice to come out in such terrible weather”: ibid.
“with that, she went straight to my heart”: ibid.
“He was nice and fat”: ibid., 72.
“the most wonderful news of all”: William “Bill” Bloomer to Betty Ford, letter, April 28, 1950, Gerald and Betty Ford Special Materials Collection, box B2, folder “Bloomer, William,” Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library, Ann Arbor, MI.
“Clara was like an angel that came into our lives”: TTOML, 69.
She and her husband, Raymond, had no children of their own: Susan Ford Bales, discussion, October 6, 2016.
wearing a uniform of a white dress, always freshly cleaned and pressed: ibid.
“just beginning to giggle and grr”: TTOML, 73.
“That’s right, talk to your dad”: ibid.
“What’s new? . . . What book should I read?”: ibid., 65.
“If I acted smart, and looked smart”: BAGA, 35.
“She was terribly nervous”: Boorn, “Betty’s Blooming,” 118.
“a small act of courage”: TTOML, 65.
There were strict rules for residents: United States Department of the Interior, National Park Service, “National Register of Historic Places Registration Form,” Parkfairfax Historic District, City of Alexandria, Virginia, December 14, 1998, available at www.dhr.virginia.gov/registers/Cities/Alexandria/100-0151_Parkfairfax_HD_1999_Final_Nomination.pdf.
“Let me fix you something to eat”: TTOML, 75.
“All I want,” she said, “is a martini and a sandwich”: ibid.
“Once I took him to visit somebody”: ibid., 78.
“wall to wall with tricycles and wagons and toys”: Betty Ford, interview.
“If you are going to run for Congress”: ibid.
They bought a plot for a token $10: “President Ford: The House,” Clover College Park Civic Association online, www.clovercollegepark.com, accessed February 10, 2017.
“surrounded by empty lots and mounds of red Virginia clay”: TTOML, 79.
“to go out in cowboy hats and discover snakes”: ibid., 80.
“dear little pink-wrapped bundle”: ibid.
“My seat in the House seemed safe”: ATTH, 71.
“I dreamed of becoming Speaker of the House”: ibid.
“the tiniest bit sorry”: TTOML, 82.
“so swollen and sweaty”: ibid., 90.
“not because the birth was so imminent”: ibid.
6: Wife and Mother
“I don’t know how many times I went to Mount Vernon”: TTOML, 63.
“I know it’s legal”: ATTH, 70.
“I saw that I would have to grow . . . being left behind”: Boorn, “Betty’s Blooming,” 18.
“begging and borrowing from museums and friends”: TTOML, 93.
“shake up the Republican wives”: ibid., 122.
“If anybody asks you to do anything”: ibid.
“the busy wife of a
congressman”: Bet Hart, “How Does She Dress So Well and Not Spend a Fortune?,” Ladies’ Home Journal, April 1961, 76.
“the party in power . . . you have to convince on legislation”: TTOML, 98.
His office happened to be across the hall from John F. Kennedy’s: President Gerald R. Ford, foreword to President John F. Kennedy Assassination Report of the Warren Commission, signed limited ed. (Nashville: FlatSigned Press, 2004), iii.
“The Kennedy White House was much more sophisticated”: TTOML, 98.
“I don’t know how Mrs. Kennedy ever got the ladies”: ibid.
Details about the Mount Vernon dinner: Clint Hill with Lisa McCubbin, Mrs. Kennedy and Me (New York: Gallery Books, 2012), 94–98.
“It took you back in time”: TTOML, 100.
“Of course, they outranked the Johnsons”: ibid.
“Being a housewife seems to me a much tougher job”: Cokie Roberts, “Eulogy by Cokie Roberts” (Betty Ford Memorial Service, Palm Desert, CA, July 12, 2011, transcript available at Gerald R. Ford Presidential Foundation online), https://geraldrfordfoundation.org/eulogy-by-cokie-roberts.
“All of us were always rushing”: Block, “Betty Ford Nobody Knows,” 140.
“I remember her . . . screaming at her ankles”: TTOML, 92.
“You got up, you got dressed, and we went to church on Sunday”: Susan Ford Bales, discussion, October 6, 2016.
“Dad was always home for Sunday-night dinner”: ibid.
“I know that the children looked forward”: ATTH, 72.
“Our house was chaos”: Susan Ford Bales, discussion, October 6, 2016.
“truth test”: ibid.
“you can forget about order”: TTOML, 92.
“Jack, give Mike your gladiator helmet!”: Charles Peterson, “The First Family and Christmas Memories,” Washington Post, Parade, December 21, 1975; corroborated by Jack Ford, email message to author, April 3, 2018.
There was a joke: Susan Ford Bales, discussion, October 6, 2016.
“Mom was able to deal with the blood”: Steve Ford, discussion, November 23, 2016.
“They’d take my roller skates”: Susan Ford Bales, discussion, October 6, 2016.
“I put in three years’ hard time”: TTOML, 95.
“I got a modicum of respect for this minor talent”: ibid.
“Their bodies aren’t made to do that”: Susan Ford Bales, discussion, October 6, 2016.
“Be a giraffe”: ibid.
“When you have a pool in your backyard”: ibid.
“We are not lifeguards”: ibid.
“One of my strongest memories”: Steve Ford, discussion, November 23, 2016.
“We had rabbits, hamsters, gerbils—you name it, we had it”: Susan Ford Bales, discussion, October 6, 2016.
“At the time, I guess it was legal”: Steve Ford, discussion, November 23, 2016.
“It would bite you every time you got near it”: ibid.
“I’ll never forget”: ibid.
“But Mother ended up”: Susan Ford Bales, discussion, October 6, 2016.
“Clara helped dig the grave”: TTOML, 93.
“He called to say”: Michael Ford, discussion, October 26, 2017.
“The first thing he would make us do”: Susan Ford Bales, discussion, October 6, 2016; also Steve Ford, discussion, November 23, 2016.
“Dear Mom, you’re the greatest”: Steve Ford, discussion, November 23, 2016.
“Okay. You’re free to go”: ibid.; corroborated by Susan Ford Bales, discussion, October 6, 2016.
“We’d ride them back and forth”: Susan Ford Bales, discussion, October 6, 2016.
“They would take all of the things”: Anne Holkeboer, interview by Richard Norton Smith, August 8, 2008, Oral History Project, Gerald R. Ford Presidential Foundation, Grand Rapids, MI, 13, https://geraldrfordfoundation.org/centennial-docs/oralhistory/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/Anne-Holkeboer.pdf.
“How grown up you are”: Steve Ford, discussion, November 23, 2016.
“She ran our house”: Susan Ford Bales, discussion, October 6, 2016.
“Don’t expect me to bail you out of this”: ibid.
“They were not rescuers”: ibid.
“Wait until your father gets home”: Kenneth Gross, “Mrs. Gerald Ford Is Reluctant First Lady,” Madison (WI) Capital Times, August 14, 1974.
“Dad would always come home”: Susan Ford Bales, discussion, October 6, 2016.
“It put a strain on the marriage”: TTOML, 126.
“I’d have my five o’clock drink”: BAGA, 34.
“Dad and Mom would always have an evening drink”: Michael Ford, interview by Richard Norton Smith, May 2, 2011, Oral History Project, Gerald R. Ford Presidential Foundation, Grand Rapids, MI, 5, https://geraldrfordfoundation.org/centennial-docs/oralhistory/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/Mike-Ford.pdf.
7: A Second Mother
“She was my mom when my mom wasn’t home”: Susan Ford Bales, discussion, October 6, 2016.
“We embraced her that way”: Steve Ford, discussion, November 23, 2016.
“I really didn’t have a chance to nurse”: TTOML, 134.
“You loved it”: Susan Ford Bales, discussion, October 6, 2016.
“She and I used to laugh about everything”: TTOML, 136.
“She was wonderful”: Michael Ford, discussion, October 26, 2017.
“Now, Steve Ford”: Steve Ford, discussion, November 23, 2016.
“My mom made the best meatloaf”: Susan Ford Bales, discussion, October 6, 2016.
“Clara was a mainstay”: ATTH, 71.
“we’d all pile into Mom and Dad’s bed”: Susan Ford Bales, discussion, October 6, 2016; corroborated by Michael Ford, discussion, October 26, 2017; and Steve Ford, discussion, November 23, 2016.
“It was ‘wrasslin’ ”: Susan Ford Bales, discussion, October 6, 2016.
“Swing low, sweet chariot”: ibid.
“She was an incredible woman”: ibid.
“Whatever void needed to be filled”: Lynette Williams Thomas, in discussion with author, September 22, 2017.
“It wasn’t punishment”: Susan Ford Bales, discussion, October 6, 2016.
“And she knew everything”: Steve Ford, discussion, November 23, 2016.
“Steve Ford”: ibid.
“She got really mad at me”: ibid.
“But,” she wrote, “in a way, she was their mother”: TTOML, 134.
“All of us loved her”: ATTH, 71.
“He seemed so much brighter”: TTOML, 114.
“The news was crushing”: ibid., 102.
“seemed to move through a haze of pomp”: ibid.
“There weren’t many tears”: ibid.
“Up until that moment”: ibid., 104.
“Jerry attended meetings religiously”: ibid., 106.
“Beyond a reasonable doubt”: ATTH, 76.
“I would imagine that Jerry knows”: TTOML, 106.
“Some of my fondest memories were spending summers at Ottawa Beach”: Carol Steves, “Once-Rebellious Jack Ford Plays Host to Republicans,” Detroit Free Press, August 4, 1996.
“I’m taking you to the emergency room”: ATTH, 83.
“I knew exactly how that happened”: DeFreest (name appears as Mrs. Collins C. Clark), interview, 22.
“put her in a soft collar”: ATTH, 83.
“The first time the hospital attendants took me”: TTOML, 118.
“Clara was indispensable”: ATTH, 83.
“Don’t let the pain start”: BAGA, 35.
In the 1960s, there were no warning labels: Dr. Marvin Seppala, chief medical officer, Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation, in discussion with author, September 28, 2017.
“Mother’s Little Helpers”: Deborah Frazier, “ ‘Mother’s Little Helper’: Valium: Most Abused Drug in Nation,” Eau Claire (WI) Leader Telegram, May 11, 1977.
“If I became minority leader”: ATTH, 77.
“Go for it, Dad”: ibid.
8: “Mom’s Really Upset; You Need to
Go Fix It”
“he was wonderful”: Dorothy Marks, “Physical, Psychological and Emotional Changes Seen in Betty Ford,” Women’s News Service, May 17, 1974.
“Dad had tunnel vision”: BAGA, 148.
“the wife of Minority Leader Gerald R. Ford”: ibid., 35.
“I couldn’t accept that people liked me for myself”: ibid.
“What are you doing here?”: TTOML, 123.
“were going through adolescence”: Marks, “Physical, Psychological and Emotional Changes.”
“I hated feeling crippled”: BAGA, 35.
“We kids took advantage of that”: Steve Ford, discussion, November 23, 2016.
“a doormat to the kids”: BAGA, 35.
“Jack’s the son with whom I’ve crossed swords most often”: TTOML, 114; corroborated by Jack Ford, discussion, February 17, 2018.
“Mom’s really upset”: Susan Ford Bales, discussion, September 24, 2017.
“It’s okay, Mom”: ibid.
“That’s it!”: ibid.; also mentioned in TTOML, 124, and BAGA, 36.
What does she mean?: Susan Ford Bales, discussion, September 24, 2017.
“whole ungrateful family”: BAGA, 36.
“I need to get hold of my dad”: Michael Ford, discussion, October 26, 2017.
“Let me go talk to Mother”: Susan Ford Bales, discussion, September 24, 2017.
“Mrs. Ford, it’s Clara”: ibid.
“Dad went up with Mom”: ibid.
“Your momma is sick”: ibid.
“I’d been too busy”: BAGA, 36.
“the problem that has no name”: Betty Friedan, The Feminine Mystique (New York: W. W. Norton, 1963), 63.
“We can no longer ignore”: ibid., 22.
“I saw no reason to discuss my drinking”: BAGA, 37.
“I had to step in”: Michael Ford, discussion, October 26, 2017.
“I think most of my family”: Jack Ford, discussion, February 17, 2018.
“No doubt that my role”: Steve Ford, discussion, January 16, 2018.
9: The Nixon White House
“terribly wrong”: TTOML, 127.
“I just wasn’t the Bionic Woman”: ibid.
“You won’t have Nixon to kick around anymore”: Jason Schwartz, “The Last Press Conference,” Richard Nixon Foundation online, last modified November 14, 2017, www.nixonfoundation.org/2017/11/55-years-ago-last-press-conference.
“That, and by the time she got four kids”: Susan Ford Bales, discussion, October 6, 2016.
“zooming down the slopes”: ATTH, 94.
Betty Ford Page 42