Eileen Ford

Eileen Cecile Ford (née Otte; March 25, 1922 – July 9, 2014) was an American modeling agency executive. Along with her husband Gerard "Jerry" Ford, she co-founded Ford Models in 1946, which emerged as one of the earliest and most successful modeling agencies in the mid and late-20th century.

Eileen Cecile Ottensoser was born in Manhattan, New York City, and raised in suburban Great Neck on Long Island, the only daughter of four children of Loretta Marie (née Laine) and Nathaniel Otte.

She attended Barnard College, where she was a model during the summers of her freshman and sophomore years for Harry Conover's modeling agency, one of the first in the United States. She graduated from Barnard in 1943.

The following year, in 1944, she met her future husband, Gerard "Jerry" Ford, at a drugstore near the Columbia University. They eloped, marrying in November 1944 in San Francisco. Shortly thereafter, Jerry, who was in the U.S. Navy, was deployed during World War II.

With her husband Jerry deployed, Ford began her career as a secretary to photographer Elliot Clark, and then as a fashion stylist, copywriter, and fashion reporter for The Tobe Report. A pregnant Eileen then began working as a secretary for several models, taking calls at her father's New York City law office, and charging each model $65 to $75 monthly for administrative support. In March 1947, she gave birth to their first child, a daughter, Jamie.

In March 1946, her husband returned from his deployment, and he joined Eileen in creating a modeling agency. After only a year, Eileen and Jerry sold their car and relocated their agency to a third-floor walkup office on Second Avenue in Manhattan.

Within a year, the modeling agency emerged as one of the most successful agencies in the nation, grossing $250,000. The Fords' first superstar model was Jean Patchett. The Fords had the capital to instill the voucher system, something that other modeling agencies were not affluent enough to offer. Dorian Leigh described Eileen as "one of the hardest working, most persistent persons I have ever known, two qualities which made her my very good friend for years and later, my unanticipated enemy".

After two years, the Fords were competing seriously with the modeling industry's two leading agencies, those of Huntington Hartford and John Robert Powers. Leigh closed her modeling agency when she was pregnant with her third child in 1948. Leigh called Eileen and told them that her 15-years younger sister, Suzy Parker, was making only $25 per hour working as a model for Huntington Hartford. Leigh felt Suzy, although only 16 years old, should be making $40 per hour, and told Ford she would join her two-year-old agency only if they took Parker sight-unseen. Anxious to represent Leigh, they agreed. Expecting a younger version of the raven-haired, blue-eyed, very slender, 5'4" Dorian, the Fords were shocked to see Parker was 5'10" with green eyes, and freckles.