25 years in congress. And then into his president ial and postpresident ial experience. In the first gallery, we feature his foundational years. He grew up in grand rapids, michigan, but he was not born in grand rapids. He was born in omaha, nebraska. His mother had married a businessman in omaha by the name of leslie king. So, she was dorothy king. They had a child in july of 1913. They named him leslie lynch king, jr. He is the person we know as gerald ford. We have his christening gown and a few other things of interest, but one of the things we feature in this case is the baby book. A lot of mothers keep books on their children, even today. Dorothy was no exception back in 1913. She began keeping a book on the babys experience. We cant present the real thing, but we present a duplicate in flip form. Some of the things you see are the first picture of dorothy with the baby. He was born in a house in omaha, nebraska, his grandfathers house. Some of the other interesting features about it is she records babys first outings. The first entry is this taxicab ride. It occurred two weeks after his birth. That is when dorothy king was fleeing leslie lynch king. He proved to be a very abusive husband. And that abuse began on the wedding day, through the honeymoon, and extended into the time of her pregnancy. As soon as she recovered her strength after the birth of the child, she secreted him into a taxi cab and drove them over to council bluffs, iowa, where she then records babys first train ride. She takes him to chicago where her parents lived outside of chicago in harvard, illinois. So, she has fled her husband. Her husband files suit for abandonment for divorce on grounds of abandonment. Then she countersues on grounds for abuse. The judge decides in her favor. This is 649 union, a house that still exists in grand rapids. That is the home of his youth. Dorothy brought junior to grand rapids because her parents were developing real estate in the area, along with another partner of her fathers. Here she met a paint salesman by the name of gerald ford. And by february, 1917, they had gotten married. They had themselves and the young child who they continued to call junior. In time he just became gerald ford, jr. There never was an adoption, but there was a family. Gerald senior was a loving father. They would go on to have other children. Tom, dick, and jim. The kids became active in school and social organizations. Each one of them became a boy scout. Gerald became junior became an eagle scout by the time he was 14 years old. Junior often is described as that boy scout, the ideal boy scout. That wasnt always the case. Ford brought with him into his youth some of the characteristics that his birth father exhibited. One of those was his temper. Junior had an excitable temper. There was a story that is told of him as a young child in his front yard where neighbor kids wanted to climb a tree but he claimed that as his tree and he will would not let them climb it. He stepped on their fingers when they grabbed for limbs. His mother determined that temper was not going to be carried into adulthood. He would not get away with the things his birth father got away with. She did a number of Different Things to help curb that. She made him memorize poetry. Roger kiplings poem if was one he carried into his adulthood. Bible verses. One became his favorite that he would lean on into adulthood. He was also ridiculed by his mother when he exhibited these tempers. She would show him faces he was making. She would shame him and show him the ridiculousness of his behavior. He recalled all of these things in his adulthood. And recalled how that helped him to control a temper that never left him. But did not control him either. Junior lived in what i guess we would call a lower middle class family. Dorothy married gerald ford, sr. , who was a paint salesman. Ford was ambitious and wanted to start his own company. He bought part of the company he worked for and turned it into the ford paint and varnish company. It was a company he started two weeks before the stock market crash in october, 1929. He was able to hold on to the company through the depression. In fact, it stayed in the family into the 1960s. It was one he struggled to hold onto. But it was that type of family that ford grew up in. Ford himself was made to work, to earn his money. One of the jobs he had was at a burger joint across the street from south high. A place called bills place. Bill was the proprietor of this store. He hired star athletes from the high school to entice other kids to come to his burger joint and spend their lunch money. One of the star athletes was junior ford. People would come to see the friday night stars when they were eating their lunch. Him an it was at bills place we one of the important events, formative events in juniors life took place. He was 16 years old. It was in the spring of 1930. He was working at bills place one day when he noticed a new car pulled up and stopped in front of the store. That was unusual for this part of grand rapids because nobody owned new cars. This was a brandnew lincoln automobile. This big fellow stepped out of it and stepped into the entryway of the store and paused for a long time and stared at junior. Finally, ford asked him if he could help him. The man looked at him and said, you are leslie lynch king, jr. And he said no, im gerald ford, jr. He said well, you are my son. Im your father and i want to take you to lunch. Well, of course, that shocked junior. He went back to see bill and said this guy says hes my father and he wants to take me to lunch. Bill said i guess you better go with him. They went to a place called the cherry inn and had lunch together. Junior, his birth father, and his birth fathers wife, margaret. King told him about his life in wyoming. He lived outside riverton, wyoming, in between riverton and shoshone. He wanted junior to come out and live with him. Of course, young ford had no interest in doing that. He lived in a very happy home, and why would he be at all eager to make a change . He said no, im happy here. He was later asked how difficult it was for him to hold his temper at that moment. He said there are times you to bite your tongue and be polite and this was one of those moments. Otherwise, he was angry. He didnt understand what was going on. This fellow claimed to be his father. If he was his father, why wasnt he involved in his life . This fellow was a stranger to him. He knew also he was going to have to go home and tell his parents about it, about the experience. He wasnt looking forward to that. It was a hard dinner that night. Afterwards he took his parents into the living room and explained what had happened, the experience he had. He said there were tears shed in the living room as his mother told him the story about his birth father, her leaving him, and coming to grand rapids. Fords parents were in their own way ambitious. Ambitious to make something of themselves, to be something in grand rapids. Junior ford also was very ambitious. And one of the things he wanted to be was a leader in his school and on the playing field. In school, what he wanted to be was president of the Student Council, president of the senior class. At the beginning of the senior year, students competed for these different offices as they do today. Ford ran on the progressive ticket. He said he did that because some but he got in front of him and claimed the republican ticket. One that was left to him in this bull moose era, Teddy Roosevelt and the bull moose era, and he was going to run on the progressive ticket. He put together a team. On election day, every member of his team was elected to their offices but he lost miserably to a fellow by the name of leo van tassle. He was elected president by an overwhelming margin. As everybody knows, these offices are popularity contests. It raises the question, why in the world did the most popular student at south high lose so terribly to somebody who wasnt that popular . It was later revealed his coach, his football coach, called the other athletes into a room and said i want you to torpedo that election. Him because ford is the captain of the team, the football team. And he needs to be on the practice field. He doesnt need to be wasting his time at Student Council meetings. The other athletes took that to heart and went out and make sure ford lost. Ford was wellknown as an athlete. He made his name as an athlete. He was on the swim team at the ymca. He was on the track and field team at south high. He played basketball at south high, but he was best known on the football field. That is where he made his name. He was a star center for the state championship south high football team. And he was captain of the team. But he wasnt just an athlete. He was also a scholar. In the classroom, he was solid. In fact, south high gave an award to the outstanding male scholar and female scholar. Dorothy gray was the female scholar and gerald ford was named the male scholar for both his gpa and for his civic activity. He wanted to go to the university of michigan. And the university of michigan was recruiting him as an athlete. He found it difficult however because his parents didnt have a lot of money. And he didnt have enough money to pay the tuition his first year. And it became a Community Affair to get gerald ford to the university of michigan. It was his principal who said we will help you financially to get there. He starts a book sale, a Library Book Sale that establishes a scholarship to provide money to needy students. The first scholarship recipient is gerald ford. They give him 100, which pays his first years tuition at the university of michigan. 50 per semester. He is 18 years old when he gets to the university of michigan. He wants to have fun as well as apply himself to his studies. He earns solid grades at the university of michigan and he excels on the football field once he is given the opportunity to perform as a starter his senior year. He pledges to a fraternity, delta kappa epsilon. Delta kappa epsilon has a reputation as the party house. You wonder why this otherwise serious student would want to pledge to dek. Its probably as much a case that they want him as he wants dek. It is constantly being threatened with expulsion. Their gpa is traditionally the lowest among the greek houses on the university of michigan. There was hope among some of the brothers if they could get ford, he could help their gpa. And he could help right their ship. In fact, they give him responsibility by his senior year of turning their budget around. One of the other things in the depression era was that the house is financially strapped. They were in the red. They turned the treasurers responsibilities over to ford. By the time he graduates, he may not have helped their gpa that much. What he does help keep them on campus, and he puts them in the black. He puts them on a paying basis. By the time gerald ford leaves the university of michigan, he wants to enter law school. He would like to enter law school at the university of michigans law school. The problem is they dont have a job for him. Ford needs a job in order to go to school. He still has to pay his tuition some way. And he is coming out of the university of michigan somewhere around 1000 in debt. The football coach at the university of michigan, coach kipchy, introduces him to the coach at yale. He has a job for him coaching Junior Varsity football, line coaching for the varsity team, and coaching boxing at yale. Him will that earns ford a paycheck. It does not get him into Yale Law School. He approaches Yale Law School and the school assesses him. They said he would be a fine student, but not if he has a job. You cant go to yale law, take on the load of study that is demanded by them, and hold a job. So the reasoning goes. Ford also talks with his coaches about that, who tell him, well, you cant really go to law school and fulfill your coaching responsibilities. He has these dynamics working against his ambition to become a lawyer. He takes some provisional classes elsewhere to demonstrate he can do the work. Using that, he gets himself admitted into Yale Law School. He does not tell them he has this other job. He does not tell his other coaches he is going to go to law school. By this means, he is able to do both. He ends up graduating in the top 25 of his law school while fulfilling his coaching responsibilities. Yale law school represents more than just him attaining the means to fill a profession. It means him opening up. He spent six years at yale. During that time, he meets a woman by the name of phyllis brown. Betty ford will be the great love of gerald fords life. Betty is not his first love however. Phyllis brown is a professional model. Younger than he, she is about 21 years old. But she is one of the top models in new york city. The coaches have a term for her, a name for her, they call her perfect body brown. Ford is competing for her attention. He says in order to compete for her attention, he has to take on her interests. Her interests largely revolved around his strength, which is sports. She plays tennis, golf, and she skis. All these things are rather new to gerald ford. But he takes them up and becomes more than proficient at each one of them. By that means, he is able to catch her eye. They date. By 1938, it is presumed they are going to be married. He brings her back to michigan for a couple of summers. He visits her parents up in maine. They attend any number of events and broadway plays in new york. She goes out on modeling shoots. He follows her on those shoots. At times, he ends up in the magazines alongside her. These are photographs from one of those shoots where she is on a ski slope in vermont. There he is alongside with her in one of the national magazines. Phyllis brown represents to gerald ford an opening up, a broadening of his experiences, of his vision. He sees the west coast. She introduces him to a large part of that. He sees new york city. She is there at his side to guide him through those experiences. She is urbane. She is witty. He is midwestern. If not plotting, at least stalid in his attitude. She does a lot to broaden his horizons. When it comes down to the