Susan Ford Bales

Susan Ford
Speaking at the official naming ceremony of the USS Gerald R. Ford (CVN 78), 2007.
Born	Susan Elizabeth Ford (1957-07-06) July 6, 1957 (age 59) Washington, D.C., United States
Alma mater	University of Kansas
Occupation	Author Photojournalist
Title	Chairman of the Board, Betty Ford Center
Predecessor	Elizabeth Bloomer Ford
Spouse(s)	Charles Vance (1979–1988) Vaden Bales (m. 1989)
Parent(s)	Gerald Ford Betty Ford
Relatives	Michael Gerald Ford (brother) Steven Ford (brother) John Gardner Ford (brother) Dorothy Ayer Gardner Ford (grandmother) Leslie Lynch King Sr. (biological grandfather) Gerald Rudolff Ford (step-grandfather) Charles Henry King (great-grandfather) Thomas Gardner Ford (half-uncle)

Susan Elizabeth Ford Bales (born July 6, 1957) is an American author, photojournalist, and former chair of the board of the Betty Ford Center for alcohol and drug abuse.

Ford is the youngest child and only daughter of former U.S. President Gerald Ford and former First Lady Betty Ford. She was one of three people targeted for violence by the Symbionese Liberation Army and had Secret Service protection well before her father became president. As a teenager attending the Holton-Arms School in Bethesda, Maryland, she held her senior prom, for the class of 1975, in the East Room of the White House. She served as official White House hostess when her mother was hospitalized for breast cancer.

Ford enrolled in Mount Vernon College for Women (now part of the George Washington University) in northwest Washington, D.C. in 1975 when her father was in the White House. She later transferred to the University of Kansas for the spring semester of 1977.

Ford Bales trained as a photographer and worked as a photojournalist for the Associated Press, Newsweek, Money Magazine, Ladies Home Journal, the Topeka Capital-Journal, the Omaha Sun and also freelanced. She was hired to shoot publicity stills for the film Jaws 2, with many appearing in Ray Loynd's book Jaws 2 Log.