News

Steve Ford shares inside stories of Betty and president

Steve Ford speaks at the Women Helping Women fundraiser on Friday.

By Bill Moss, Published: October 24, 2014

Steve Ford, keynote speaker for the annual Women Helping Women luncheon at Kenmure Country Club, had an overflow crowd of 250 people laughing at the foibles of the First Family during their time in the White House and then cheering the life and legacy of his mother, Betty, whose public battles with breast cancer and alcoholism helped women face both.

Ford, who went on to an acting career after the family left the White House — starring on TV in "The Young and the Restless," "Walker, Texas Ranger;" "JAG," "Suddenly Susan," and "Murder She Wrote," and as Meg Ryan's boyfriend in "When Harry Met Sally" — was 18 years old when President Nixon's resignation vaulted his father into the Oval Office in August 1974.
Ford had been appointed vice president after the resignation of Spiro Agnew, at a time when Betty Ford had tired of politics and hoped for a return to a quiet life in Grand Rapids, Mich.
"Dad put his arm around her and said, 'Don't worry, Betty, vice presidents don't do anything,'" Ford recalled. "It didn't work out that way."
Ford's ascension to the office after the Watergate scandal was unprecedented.

"Most of the time when a president is sworn into office, there are galas, parties, parades — a celebration," he said. "That's not how this was."
The Watergate scandal had created a constitutional crisis. There was the war in Vietnam, Cold War with the Soviet Union, runaway inflation. "This will never happen again in the history of America probably," he said.
Ford told stories that reminded the audience of his dad's reputation as somewhat of a bumbler. Gerald Ford, the House minority leader, was on the short list of candidates to be appointed vice president. The candidates were told the White House would call the designee at 7:30 at night. The modest Ford home in Alexandria, Va., had a public line and listed phone number, with several extensions, and a private line. At 7:30 p.m. the private line rang and Susan Ford answered upstairs in her parents' bedroom.
"Dad picks up on the phone and on the other end was Gen. Alexander Haig, Nixon's chief of staff," Ford said. "He said the president has something he thinks you and your wife would like to hear and handed the phone to the president." Ford told him, "'If you could just call back on the other line, Betty could get on,' and he hung up."
"I'm a 17-year-old kid and even to me it just didn't seem like a career move," he said to the crowd's laughter. Five tense minutes went by — "with rumblings in the background of 'way to go, Dad'" — before the White House found the public number and called back.

Ford became president under such sudden circumstances that the family did not move into the White House for a week. After taking the oath of office, they went home to Alexandria, and Betty went back into the kitchen to make supper.
"She said, 'something's wrong here. You just became president of the United States and I'm still cooking,'" Ford said.
Ford said the recent news about breaches of White House security has put one of the family stories in a new light.
The president had to get up at 2 a.m. one morning to take out their dog Liberty. Ford took him out on the White House lawn — no Secret Service, no one knows he is outside. "Dad turns around to go back in the White House. The door's locked," he said. "So at one time they did lock that door."

'Life turned upside down'

The First Lady found out during a routine physical that her doctor suspected she had breast cancer and might need surgery right way. Her first reaction was, "I can't go in for surgery. I have a busy day tomorrow."
"So life was turned upside down," he said. "I remember Mom and Dad standing on the White House lawn talking to the press for one reason and one reason only. They wanted to take the stigma off this disease."
The announcement triggered an immediate positive response. Nearly 100,000 women sent cards of support and donations poured in for cancer research. As a young man, Ford said, he was especially affected by the letters his dad got from men who said, "Thank you for showing me how to stand next to my wife and be proud of her."
After Ford lost, he and Betty moved to California. The children were grown and gone and the former president was traveling most of the time.
"It created this perfect storm where mother was home alone and she became very lonely," he said. Alcohol plus painkillers prescribed for a pinched nerve "created this cocktail that started this addiction in her life."
As with breast cancer, Betty Ford's experience with a disease that was common but stigmatized became a touchstone in the culture. She went into a 30-day treatment at Long Beach Naval Hospital, recovered and founded the Betty Ford Center, which has helped 95,000 patients and families recover from addiction.
"She helped change the perception of two major diseases for women — alcoholism and breast cancer," Ford said.