Betty Ford (Elizabeth Ann Bloomer Warren Ford ) dead at 93, RIP #BettyFord

Betty Ford (Elizabeth Ann Bloomer Warren Ford ) was the wife of former United States President Gerald Ford and served as the First Lady of the United States from 1974 to 1977. As First Lady, Ford was active in social policy and shattered precedents[citation needed] as a politically active presidential wife., an outspoken and immensely popular former first lady who overcame alcohol and prescription-drug addictions and helped found the now-world-famous rehab clinic that bears her name, died yesterday. She was 93.A spokeswoman said Ford died at Eisenhower Medical Center in Palm Springs, Calif. Details were not immediately released.Once nicknamed the "fighting first lady" by Time magazine because of her uncomfortably candid views, Ford held firm to opinions that were vastly different than those of her husband's Republican Party.

She strongly supported women's rights while husband Gerald Ford was president from 1974 to 1977, and was part of the doomed effort to get states to pass the Equal Rights Amendment.She also took a tolerant stance on abortion, admitted without shame that some of her kids had tried marijuana -- and wasn't alarmed by the prospect of her daughter having premarital sex.

And after her 1974 mastectomy less than two months after her husband succeeded the disgraced Richard Nixon -- Ford became an early campaigner against breast cancer."She was a wonderful wife and mother; a great friend; and a courageous first lady," former President George H.W. Bush said. "No one confronted life's struggles with more fortitude or honesty, and as a result, we all learned from the challenges she faced."President Obama also praised Ford for her "courage and compassion."

"As our nation's first lady, she was a powerful advocate for women's health and women's rights," he said. "While her death is a cause for sadness, we know that organizations such as the Betty Ford Center will honor her legacy by giving countless Americans a new lease on life."

Services are expected to be held in Palm Springs.

The women's movement

Ford continued to be an active leader and activist of the feminist movement after the Ford administration, and continued to strongly advocate and lobby politicians and state legislatures for passage of the Equal Rights Amendment. 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 Congress, and the President on how to improve the status of American women. Ford was an outspoken supporter of equal pay, breast cancer awareness, and the ERA throughout her life.

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 marching on Pennsylvania Avenue. The march was led by prominent feminist leaders, including Ford, Betty Friedan, Gloria Steinem, Bella Abzug, and Elizabeth Chittick. In 1981 National Organization for Women president Eleanor Smeal announced Ford's appointment to be the co-chair, with Alan Alda, of the ERA Countdown Campaign. As the deadline approached, Ford led marches, parades, and rallies for the Equal Rights Amendment 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 and visited states, like Illinois, where ratification was believed to have the most realistic chance of passing.In 2004, she reaffirmed her pro-choice stance and her support for Roe v. Wade and reaffirmed her belief in and support for the ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment.

In 1987, Ford underwent quadruple coronary bypass surgery and recovered without complications. In November 18, 1991, she was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President George H.W. Bush and a Congressional Gold Medal in 1999. On May 8, 2003, Ford received the prestigious Woodrow Wilson Award in Los Angeles for her public service from the Woodrow Wilson Center of the Smithsonian Institution. She resided in Rancho Mirage and in Beaver Creek, Colorado, with her husband during these years. Her husband died at their Rancho Mirage home of heart failure on December 26, 2006 at the age of 93. 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. She was greatly admired for the dignity she showed the nation during this period.

Following her husband's death, Ford continued to live in Rancho Mirage. At the age of 93, she was the oldest surviving former occupant of the White House. She was also the third longest-lived first lady behind Bess Truman and Lady Bird Johnson. 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. Her ill health prevented her from attending the funeral of former first lady Lady Bird Johnson in July 2007. Ford's daughter Susan attended instead, representing her mother at the funeral service.Gerald and Betty Ford were the first U.S. President and First Lady to both live into their nineties. On July 6, 2011, former First Lady Nancy Reagan turned 90, and thus she and her husband, former President Ronald Reagan, joined the Fords as the second first couple to both live into their nineties.On April 8, 2011, Ford turned 93, the same age that her late husband, President Ford reached on his last birthday, July 14, 2006.She died on July 8, 2011, in Rancho Mirage.