By Jessica Grose
Betty Ford, who died on Friday at the age of 93, was first lady before I was born, so I knew her only as the namesake of the rehab clinic she co-founded in 1982. When I read the obituaries of Ford published in The Washington Post and the New York Times this weekend, I was surprised to discover that she was, according to the Post, “an activist first lady” who “provided the women’s movement with an impressive ally.” According to the Times:
Mrs. Ford rarely hesitated to make public her views on touchy subjects. She held a White House news conference announcing her support of the Equal Rights Amendment; the mail response ran three to one against her. In 1975, appearing on “60 Minutes,” she said she “wouldn’t be surprised” if her daughter, Susan, had a premarital affair; the mail was four to one against her. Her husband jokingly told her later that the comment had cost him 20 million votes in the 1976 election, she said.