GRAND RAPIDS – A funeral and burial for former First Lady Betty Ford is slated for Thursday in Grand Rapids. Mrs. Ford, 93, died Friday in California where she and Former President Gerald Ford had retired to after he left the White House in 1977. She will be buried next to him at the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Museum downtown.
A funeral was held Tuesday in California attended by First Lady Michelle Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, former First Lady Nancy Reagan and former First Lady Roslyn Carter. Former President Bill Clinton also attended.
Mrs. Ford, a native of Grand Rapids, married Mr. Ford in 1948 shortly before his first election to Congress. When Mr. Ford assumed the presidency in 1974, after former President Richard Nixon resigned, he told the world he was “indebted to no man and only one woman.”
Shortly after moving into the White House, Mrs. Ford was diagnosed with breast cancer, and her public announcement of her disease helped break taboos about disclosing such issues. Public health officials credited that with helping convince thousands of women to undergo mammograms to check for cancer.
She also later acknowledged her own addictions to drugs and alcohol, and following her treatment her name became associated with one of the world’s most prominent addiction recovery centers.
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