He was born Leslie King, Jr., but after his parents were divorced and his mother remarried, he took the name of his stepfather, Gerald R. Ford. During World War II he served four years in the Navy and was discharged as a lieutenant commander. He was a football coach at Yale, and also played at the University of Michigan and dismissed invitations to play for the Green Bay Packers and the Chicago Bears. His debut into national politics was being elected chairman of the House Republican Conference in 1963. He was assigned to the Warren Commission to investigate the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. After Spiro Agnew resigned, President Nixon under the 25th Amendment nominated Ford to succeed him. Ford was the only president not to have been elected as either the president or the vice president.

Ford nominated Nelson Rockerfeller to be vice president of the United States. Thus for the first time the nation's two top offices were occupied by people that had not been elected. Two actions he took that made hit a bit less popular were giving amnesty to Vietnam War resisters and issuing former president Richard Nixon a presidential pardon stemming from the Watergate affair. In matters of foreign affairs Ford tried to maintain United States power and honor after the collapse of Cambodia and South Viet Nam. President Ford and Soviet leader Leonid I. Brezhnev agreed upon limitations concerning nuclear weapons. A few off his more favorable programs included tax cuts and bills to ease inflation. On a note concerning his wife Betty as she reveled in the admiration and respect of the nation when she admitted her addiction to alcohol and tranquilizers. In 1982, she founded the Betty Ford Drug and Alcohol Rehabilitation Center.