Former Great Neck resident Eileen Ford, who revolutionized the modeling industry and founded Ford Models, died on Wednesday July 9. She was 92.
“Eileen Ford was an industry icon and pioneer and everyone in the Ford Models family will miss her dearly,” Ford Models’ officials said in a statement. “We are incredibly proud and grateful for her revolutionary spirit and the values she instilled in Ford Models.”
Eileen Ford managed hundreds of models throughout her 40-year career with the company, which she started with her husband Jerry Ford in 1947.
Many of the models would go on to become famous outside modeling industry, including Jane Fonda, Brooke Shields, Candice Bergen, Rene Russo, Kim Basinger, Cheryl Tiegs and Jean Shrimpton.
“Being a model agent for Eileen was an avocation, not a job,” said Katie Ford, Eileen Ford’s daughter.
She said her mother was “unwavering” in representing her models’ interests.
“She never minced words if she believed a model was being treated unfairly in any way at all,” Katie Ford said.
Katie Ford said her mother looked for models “in the daily course of life, not one that was introduced to her.”
Eileen Ford would follow women walking around in public who Ford thought could be models, her daughter said.
That technique was how Eileen Ford found model Karen Graham, who would be the first face for cosmetics company Estée Lauder.
“Eileen spotted Karen while they were both walking down the stairs of Bonwit Tellers,” Katie Ford said.
Eileen Ford was born in New York City on March 25, 1922. She was raised in Great Neck and lived there until she went to Barnard College, which she graduated from in 1943.
During her freshman and sophomore years at Barnard, Eileen Ford modelled.
She married her husband Jerry Ford on Nov. 22, 1944, three months after meeting him.
Eileen Ford worked as a photographer, a stylist, a secretary, a copywriter and a fashion reporter for the Tobe Report while Jerry Ford served in the U.S. Navy during World War II.
After Jerry Ford returned from active duty, Eileen Ford soon became pregnant and had to quit her job as a stylist.
During her pregnancy, a few of Eileen Ford’s friends, who were models, asked her to manage their bookings.
“[The models] felt their agencies [were] incompetent and less than honest,” Katie Ford said
After seeing Eileen’s work with the models, Katie Ford said, her husband quit his job in the debt-collection business and sold his car to buy furniture for an office.
“Jerry recognized that Eileen’s endeavor was potentially a real business that was sorely in need of order and systems,” Katie Ford said. “Eileen had an acute eye for talent. Jerry had a sense for how to run their business.”
She said the two went on to create “unrivaled prestige on young ladies for making their name in the business.”
After just one year in business, the company billed $250,000 for their work, according to a 1948 Life Magazine article. The two moved their business into a brownstone apartment on the Upper East Side of Manhattan in 1955, Katie Ford said.
“Eileen provided a welcoming home while these young women were adjusting to a completely new life in New York,” she said.
The two also had a summer home in Southampton and would invite models and photographers to stay with them.
Eileen Ford also published five books on the topic of “beauty,” her daughter said.
Jerry Ford died six years ago.
In addition to Katie Ford, Eileen Ford is survived by three other children, eight grandchildren, six great-grandchildren and her brother William Otte.
