Gerald Ford

Gerald Rudolph Ford Jr. — born Leslie Lynch King Jr. on July 14, 1913 in Omaha, Nebraska, and renamed when his mother remarried a Grand Rapids, Michigan businessman — served as the 38th President of the United States from August 1974 through January 1977. He died December 26, 2006 in Rancho Mirage, California at the age of ninety-three.

Alexandria residency: twenty-three years

Ford’s Alexandria connection is the longest of any modern U.S. president — twenty-three continuous years across two addresses.

Parkfairfax (1951–1955)

Ford and his wife Betty (whom he married October 15, 1948) moved to parkfairfax-historic-district Place parkfairfax-historic-district 132-acre Colonial Revival garden-apartment community completed 1941–1943 by the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company under FHA defense-housing financing — an early example of … in 1951 at the start of Ford’s second term as Republican Congressman from Michigan’s 5th district. The Parkfairfax tenancy ran through 1955 — Ford’s second through fourth congressional terms. ^[1] Source 1 Washington Post — Parkfairfax presidents coverage Newspaper

Parkfairfax during these years was a defense-housing-era garden- apartment community of ~1,684 units that Metropolitan Life Insurance Company had built 1941–43 under FHA financing. Both Ford and Richard Nixon Person Richard Nixon b. 1913 · d. 1994 37th President of the United States (1969–1974). Lived in Alexandria at 3538 Gunston Road, Apt. T-2 in in two stints — 1943–44 during his Office of Price Administration work and … (who lived at 3538 Gunston Road, Apt. T-2 in Parkfairfax 1943–44 + 1947–51) made the community one of the few American neighborhoods to have housed two future presidents during their early-congressional-career years.

514 Crown View Drive (1955–1974)

In 1955 the Fords commissioned a new four-bedroom, two-bath Colonial-style house at 514 Crown View Drive, Alexandria from builder Roger Thornberry. The Crown View Drive house served as the Ford family’s home for the next nineteen years across Ford’s full congressional career, his ascent to House Minority Leader (1965–1973), his vice presidency under Richard Nixon (December 1973 – August 1974), and the first ten days of his presidency after Nixon’s August 9, 1974 resignation. ^[2] Source 2 NRHP — Gerald R. Ford Jr. House (1985) Government record

Ford was sworn in as President in the East Room of the White House at 12:03 PM on August 9, 1974 — and slept that night, and for the next ten nights, at 514 Crown View Drive in Alexandria, before the August 19, 1974 move to the White House. The Crown View Drive house is consequently the last private residence of a sitting U.S. President. ^[3] Source 3 NPS — Gerald Ford in Alexandria Website

The Crown View Drive house was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1985 as the Gerald R. Ford Jr. House and carries an HMDB historical marker.

Career arc

Ford served as Republican Congressman from Michigan’s 5th district from January 1949 through December 1973 — a twenty-five-year congressional career. He rose to House Minority Leader in 1965 and was nominated by President Nixon to fill the vice presidency after Spiro Agnew’s October 1973 resignation, taking office December 6, 1973. Less than nine months later — August 9, 1974 — Nixon resigned the presidency in the wake of Watergate and Ford became the first U.S. president to ascend to the office without being elected to either the presidency or vice presidency.

Ford’s presidency ran from August 1974 through January 1977; he lost the 1976 presidential election to Jimmy Carter. He retired to Rancho Mirage, California, where he lived for the next thirty years. He died December 26, 2006 of arteriosclerotic cerebrovascular disease and end-stage cardiac disease at age ninety-three — the longest-lived U.S. president on record at the time of his death.