Gerald Ford, 38th president of the United States, died December 26, 2006, at 93. Although the only president never elected to national office, Ford guided the nation through the tumultuous period of 1974 to 1976, struggling to restore the nation's confidence in a government tarnished by the Watergate scandal and a troubled economy.

Although he provoked widespread anger for pardoning former President Nixon for any wrongdoing in the cover-up that followed Watergate, Ford was warmly remembered as a man of integrity who helped start national healing in the wake of Vietnam and the near-impeachment of Nixon.

Ford was born Leslie Lynch King Jr. on July 14, 1913, in Omaha, Neb. His parents separated two weeks after his birth, and his mother Dorothy moved him to Grand Rapids, Mich., to live with her parents. Two years after her divorce, Dorothy married Gerald Rudolph Ford, a Grand Rapids paint salesman. The Fords began calling Leslie Gerald R. Ford Jr., although his name was not legally changed until December 1935.

Ford grew up in a close-knit family with three younger half-brothers. After graduating from South High School, he attended the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, majoring in economics and political science. He played on the university's football team and was voted most valuable player in 1934.

The NFL's Detroit Lions and Green Bay Packers both offered Ford contracts after graduation, but instead, he entered Yale University to study law. To finance his studies, he signed on as the boxing team coach and as an assistant varsity football coach.

After graduating from Yale Law in 1941, Ford returned to Grand Rapids to open a law firm with a friend from the University of Michigan, Philip Buchen. In April 1942 he joined the U.S. Naval Reserve as an ensign, becoming a physical fitness instructor at a pre-flight school in Chapel Hill, N.C. In the spring of 1943 he began service on the light aircraft carrier USS Monterrey. When the war was over, Ford returned to Grand Rapids and became a partner in the locally prestigious law firm of Butterfield, Keeny and Amberg.

Well known throughout the community, Ford decided to challenge isolationist incumbent Bartel Jonkman for the Republican nomination for the U.S. House of Representatives of 1948. Ford was elected to Congress on Nov. 2, 1948, winning 61 percent of the vote in the general election.

During the campaign, Gerald Ford married Elizabeth Ann Bloomer Warren, a department store fashion consultant and former model. The couple went on to have four children -- Michael, John, Steven and Susan.

Serving in the House from Jan. 3, 1949, to Dec. 6, 1973, Ford was reelected 12 times, each time with more than 60 percent of the vote. He became a member of the House Appropriations Committee in 1951 and the ranking minority member on the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee in 1961.

During his years in Congress, Ford opposed federal aid to education and housing, increases in the minimum wage, Medicare and anti-pollution bills. He described himself as a "moderate in domestic affairs, an internationalist in foreign affairs and a conservative in fiscal policy."

As his reputation as a legislator grew, Ford declined offers to run for both the Senate and the Michigan governorship; he instead focused on becoming speaker of the House. Despite his decision to stay in the House, his role in delicate, yet critical matters continued to grow. In 1963 President Johnson appointed Ford to the Warren Commission investigating President Kennedy's assassination.

Two years later, Ford was elected House minority leader and held the position for eight years. But the Republicans had entered a period starting in 1954 in which they would not be able to capture a majority in the U.S. House (they would not until 1994), meaning although he headed his party in the lower house of Congress, he would never be Speaker. But in the tumultuous politics of the Nixon administration, the way would soon be clear along a path the Michigan Congressman never envisioned. When Spiro Agnew resigned as vice president in late 1973 after pleading no contest to a charge of income tax evasion, President Richard Nixon reached out to Ford to join him as vice president. Ford accepted his role and, after being confirmed by the Senate 92-3, was sworn in on Dec. 6, 1973.

After the Watergate scandal broke, Nixon resigned as president and Ford was inaugurated on Aug. 9, 1974. He said, "Our long national nightmare is over. Our constitution works." It was an historic hour, Ford said, "that troubles our minds and hurts our hearts." Ford nominated Nelson Rockefeller as vice president and he was confirmed on Dec. 19, 1974.

Before any formal criminal charges were filed against Richard Nixon, President Ford granted him a pardon, believing that protracted impeachment proceedings would keep the United States mired in the Watergate aftermath. The public reacted negatively to the president's decision. While the decision to pardon Richard Nixon may have cost Ford the 1976 election, he maintained he had made the best decision for the country, public opinion notwithstanding.

"As I rejected amnesty, so I reject revenge. I ask all Americans who ever asked for goodness and mercy in their lives, who ever sought forgiveness for their trespasses, to join in rehabilitating all the casualties of the tragic conflict of the past," the president said at the time.

Besides inheriting fallout from the Watergate scandal, Ford also took on an administration plagued by the divisive Vietnam War, rising inflation and potential energy shortages. His domestic goal was to curb inflation and stimulate the economy through modest tax and spending cuts, deregulating industries and controlling energy prices to stimulate production.

"The American wage earner and the American housewife are a lot better economists than most economists care to admit," Ford told a joint session of Congress in August 1974. "They know that a government big enough to give you everything you want is a government big enough to take from you everything you have."

In foreign policy, President Ford and Secretary of State Henry Kissinger continued their policy of détente with the Soviet Union and shuttle diplomacy in the Middle East. U.S.-Soviet relations were marked by ongoing arms negotiations, the Helsinki agreements on human rights principles and East European national boundaries, trade negotiations and the symbolic Apollo-Soyuz joint manned space flight.

With the fall of South Vietnam in 1975, Congress and the president incessantly wrangled over presidential war powers, oversight of the CIA and covert operations, military aid appropriations and military personnel stationing.

On two separate trips to California in September 1975, there were two attempts on the president's life. The assailants were both women: Lynette Squeaky Fromme and Sara Jane Moore.

During the 1976 campaign, Ford fought off a strong challenge from Ronald Reagan and won the Republican nomination. Choosing Sen. Robert Dole of Kansas as his running mate, he narrowed Democrat Jimmy Carter's large lead, but ultimately lost the election.

After leaving the White House in January 1977, President Ford lectured at 179 colleges and universities, covering issues such as congressional/White House relations, federal budget policies and domestic and foreign policy issues.

The Gerald R. Ford Library in Ann Arbor, Mich., and the Gerald R. Ford Museum in Grand Rapids, Mich., were both dedicated in 1971. Since then, conferences at both sites have dealt with such subjects as Congress, the presidency and foreign policy, Soviet-American relations, German reunification, the Atlantic Alliance, the future of American foreign policy, national security, humor and the presidency and the role of first ladies.

In August 1999, Ford received the Medal of Freedom and in October of that year both President and Mrs. Ford were awarded the Congressional Gold Medal for dedicated public service and outstanding humanitarian contributions. Ford has served on the board of directors of several U.S. corporations and contributed both time and money to charities such as the Boy Scouts of America and the Betty Ford Center for addiction.

President Ford is survived by his wife Betty and his four children.

-- Compiled by Kathryn DeVito for the Online NewsHour