How a First Lady Found Her Calling
"Hearst Magazines and Yahoo may earn commission or revenue on some items through these links."
I once asked Betty Ford what the saddest day of her life was, expecting her to say it was the day she lost her father. But she surprised me, responding without hesitation: August 9, 1974. The day her husband became president. She hadn’t lost a father that day. She lost herself.
By all accounts, including her own, Elizabeth Anne Bloomer had an enchanted childhood. Born in Chicago and raised in Grand Rapids, Michigan, she loved to dance, play football with the boys, and socialize with her friends. They all called her Betty. Not even the Great Depression, with all the hardships it brought into her home, dampened her joie de vivre. To help her family out, she began to earn a little money teaching kids how to dance—which only made her happier. But her enchantment, as well as her childhood, came to a sudden, agonizing end, at age sixteen, in July 1934. Her father died in the garage of carbon monoxide poisoning.
His death was ruled accidental. It was only later that Betty realized that her underemployed, alcoholic father likely committed suicide, thinking, like George Bailey in the movie It’s a Wonderful Life, that he was worth more dead than alive. Thanks to the official cause of death, his life insurance policy paid out, helping the Bloomers weather the Depression.
Nearly 50 years later, Betty would come close to following in her father’s wake, killing herself not in a gas-filled garage, but in a fog of pills and alcohol.
As a teenager, on a lark, she and a couple of girlfriends had gone to a psychic to get a sneak peek into their futures. The two other girls got boilerplate: husbands, families, a nice white picket fence. But when it was Betty’s turn, the psychic looked into her eyes and saw something else: “You will walk with kings and queens.”
Betty Ford took to the role of first lady with relish, and at times she loved it—the socializing, the chance to express her views, and yes, the mingling with kings and queens. But she had been at Jerry’s side in Washington for over two decades, and as much as she loved him—and he loved her—being a politician’s wife took a toll on her.
She had once studied dance under Martha Graham and had a dream—a realistic one—of having a successful career as a dancer on the New York stage. But instead of becoming a star, she became the wife of one. While Congressman Ford rose to prominence, Betty did what congressmen’s wives were expected to do: attend luncheons, chauffeur and entertain constituents visiting from Michigan. Then, at night, her role would change to mom and wrangler, with four kids to corral. Like millions of others with long days and hectic schedules, at the end of the evening she’d mix a cocktail or two to help her decompress.
Then came a pinched nerve and bouts of osteoarthritis. Her doctors prescribed Darvon to control the pain and Valium to control her anxiety. No one thought twice about it. Half of America was on drugs—to wake up, go to sleep, lose weight... ease the pain.
On that day, August 9, 1974, when he assumed the presidency, Ford declared “our long national nightmare is over.” In a sense, without anyone knowing it, least of all her, Betty’s had just begun.
Betty Ford was one of the most independent-minded, outspoken, and admired first ladies in history. Following her famous (some would say infamous) 60 Minutes interview in the summer of 1975, in which she spoke in favor of abortion and the ERA and recognized the possibility that her children had smoked marijuana and had premarital sex, Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney [the President's chief of staff and his assistant] went to the president and said that she had to tone it down. Ford paused for a moment, nodding his head.
Fine,” he said. “You tell her.”
The big tough All-American from the University of Michigan knew how strong she was. The future secretary of defense and vice president decided better of it. Discretion is the better part of valor.
Betty’s willfulness served her well as first lady and as a public figure. But on a personal level, it also did damage. She refused to acknowledge the possibility of a growing dependency on—and abuse of—pills and alcohol.
The world weighed on her, the emotional stresses of raising a family and running the East Wing exacerbating the pain in her neck, her back, and her bones. To cope, she medicated.
Eventually, small cracks began to appear in her facade. A late arrival at an event. A slurred speech. A missed appearance due to “a 24-hour flu” or “exhaustion.” But she soldiered on, even reading her husband’s concession speech on the day after the election because he was too hoarse to do it. She was a tower of strength... about to crumble and fall.
I had got the call at about 10 one night. It was Ford’s daughter, Susan. She was desperate, frantic even. “Mom’s going to die if we don’t do something. We’re going to do this intervention thing with her. You’ve got to get him home.”
No was clearly not an option. Susan was the perfect blend of her mother and her father: tough, beautiful, and smart.
“Okay,” I said to myself, “the first thing I have to do is find someone to fill in at the event down in Maryland.”
Kissinger. I knew he was down in Texas taking part in some to-do put on by Ed Haggar, chairman of Haggar Clothing, famed for its slacks. I got ahold of Henry, and he said, “Sure, I’ll do it, but it’s 11 at night, I’m down here in Dallas. How am I supposed to get—”
“Okay,” I said, cutting him off. I didn’t have time to be diplomatic with the most famous diplomat in the world. “I’ll get back to you.”
So, I called Ed Haggar. Without going into too much detail, saying only that Mrs. Ford wasn’t feeling well, I explained my predicament.
“Stop,” he said, with a drawl as big as Texas. “Don’t you worry about a thing. I’ll take care of Dr. Kissinger. You get your man back to the desert to take care of his wife.”
Haggar flew Kissinger to Maryland in his private jet. There were so many people who loved the Fords and would do anything for them, because they knew the Fords would do anything for them.
With everything in place, the gears already turning, that’s when I went in and woke Ford up.
“Mr. President, we’re going home.”
At 9 the next morning, California time, we were in his office at Rancho Mirage, preparing to ambush his wife. And that’s exactly what it was. Poor, petite Betty Ford had no idea what was about to hit her.
There were 12 of us in all, not quite a platoon but larger than a squad, gathered in that office. We had flown or driven in from across the country over the last 24 hours, and now we were all going over our notes, quietly, like soldiers checking their weapons before storming the castle.
Dr. Pursch gave us our marching orders: there would be resentment, anger, and crying on Betty’s part, but we had to stand firm and be brutally honest with her. Her survival might depend on it. Pain was part of the process of healing. As we stepped out of the air-conditioned office into the glare of the morning sun, burning off the desert night chill, I thought to myself this might be the hardest walk I had ever taken.
Betty’s initial surprise and delight at seeing her sons on her doorstep gave way to apprehension as the rest of us trooped in and she saw the somber expressions on our faces. This was not a happy occasion. Her husband took her hand, led her into the sunken living room, and sat beside her on the couch. We all followed, some deploying into the stuffed and wicker chairs set around a coffee table. I stood off to the side, trying to control my emotions. Which we all were—with little success.
Betty’s oldest son, Mike, began. Then his wife Gayle. Then her son Jack.
“Betty, we love you,” Jerry interjected, trying to soothe the pain—but the words only seemed to sharpen it. The former president was powerless.
Now Betty was shaking, as if being shaken awake from those lost conversations with her son. Susan, the only daughter and youngest child, was shaking, too. She had brought the family together. But now, she could only sob, words failing her. Finally, she found her voice.
“Mom, when I was little, and even as I grew up, I always admired you for being a dancer. I wanted to be just like you. But now, these days, you’re falling and clumsy. You’re not the same person. And I’ve talked to you about things—things that were important to me, and the next day you didn’t even remember.”
The Ford kids and Gayle had started something extraordinary—a journey that would save not only their mother’s life but the lives of hundreds of others.
Inside the President's Team: Family, Service, and the Gerald Ford Presidency
Sometimes, when a thing is cracked—a mirror, a bone, a person—you have to break it before you can fix it. On that day, Betty Ford was broken. Three weeks later, on April 21, I emerged from the Alcohol Rehabilitation Service at the Navy’s Long Beach Regional Medical Center—no fancy spa in Malibu—where Betty was staying, rooming with three other women. I spoke to the approximately one hundred reporters gathered there: “Here is the statement from Mrs. Ford. ‘I have found I am not only addicted to the medication I have been taking for my arthritis, but also to alcohol… I expect this treatment and fellowship to be a solution for my problems, and I embrace it not only for me but all the many others who are here to participate.’”
Her recovery would be long and hard, but most importantly it had begun.
During her time as a politician’s wife, Betty struggled with regret, pondering the dreams she had failed to realize—a career as a model or dancer on the New York stage. But fate, karma, chance—call it what you will—moved her in a different direction. Her accomplishments would lie elsewhere. What Betty Ford did was save lives—first, when she brought breast cancer out of its dark, leprous corner, and now with her revelations about her battles with chemical dependency. She would lead the way in bringing that disease to light, as well.
On a Sunday morning early in October 1981, nearly seven years after that fateful date, Betty dug a shovel into the desert sand of Rancho Mirage, breaking ground on what would become the Betty Ford Center, a nonprofit, residential treatment facility for individuals suffering from substance abuse. Betty had found her stage after all.
Adapted from Inside the President's Team: Family, Service, and the Gerald Ford Presidency by Bob Barrett. Published by Pegasus Books on January 7, 2025.
You Might Also Like
