page_title: Betty Ford
section_title: Later life and honors
hierarchical_section_title: Betty Ford / Later life and honors
caption_attribution_description: Former First Lady Betty Ford receives the nation's highest honor, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, from President George H. W. Bush. Holding the medal is First Lady Barbara Bush.
context_page_description: Elizabeth Anne Ford was the First Lady of the United States from 1974 to 1977, as the wife of President Gerald Ford. As First Lady, she was active in social policy and set a precedent as a politically active presidential spouse. Ford also served as the Second Lady of the United States from 1973 to 1974.
  Throughout her husband's term in office, she maintained high approval ratings despite opposition from some conservative Republicans who objected to her more moderate and liberal positions on social issues. Ford was noted for raising breast cancer awareness following her 1974 mastectomy. In addition, she was a passionate supporter of the Equal Rights Amendment. As a supporter of abortion rights and a leader in the women's rights movement, she gained fame as one of the most candid first ladies in history, commenting on every hot-button issue of the time, including feminism, equal pay, the Equal Rights Amendment, sex, drugs, abortion, and gun control. She also raised awareness of addiction when in the 1970s, she announced her long-running battle with alcoholism and substance abuse, being the first First Lady to do so.
context_section_description: 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. That same year, a Golden Palm Star on the Palm Springs Walk of Stars was dedicated to her and her husband.
  On May 8, 2003, Ford received the Woodrow Wilson Award in Los Angeles for her public service, awarded by the Woodrow Wilson Center of the Smithsonian Institution.
  During these years, she and her husband resided in Rancho Mirage and in Beaver Creek, Colorado. Gerald Ford died, aged 93, of heart failure on December 26, 2006 at their Rancho Mirage home. Despite her advanced age and own frail physical condition, Ford traveled across the country and took part in the funeral events in California, Washington, D.C., and Michigan.
  Following her husband's death, Ford continued to live in Rancho Mirage. 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 Lady Bird Johnson's funeral in July 2007; her daughter Susan Ford represented her mother at the funeral service.
  In July 2018, a statue of Betty Ford was unveiled outside of the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Museum in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
caption: Betty Ford is awarded the nation's highest civilian honor, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, by President George H. W. Bush, 1991. First Lady Barbara Bush holds the medal.
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