Extract

Often portrayed as a genial politician whose chief talent was getting along well with others, Gerald Ford had the skill and ambition to serve thirteen terms in Congress, to become the House Republican leader, and to rise to the presidency. Scott Kaufman provides us with the first scholarly biography that covers Ford’s entire life. Although he does not change the general impression of Ford as an amiable man with a lifelong ambition to become Speaker of the House, he does fill in many of the details that have eluded previous biographers. He also brings Betty Ford into the narrative and explains her central importance in her husband’s adult life. Kaufman portrays her as something of a cross between the reticent Bess Truman and the brash Eleanor Roosevelt, speaking her mind on public issues such as abortion but staying well within the confines of the role of the conventional housewife. She might also be the first well-publicized example of the opioid crisis.

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