Richard Henry FORD

FORD, CANNON, BATCHELDER

Posted By: Sarah Thorson Little (email)
Date: 10/25/2006 at 13:19:15

Richard Henry Ford, 80, a former merchant mariner and government relations official for an American flag steamship company, died July 19 at Inova Fairfax Hospital of complications of a stroke. He lived in Fairfax. Mr. Ford was born in Eagle Grove, Iowa. After graduating from high school in Moline, Ill., he entered the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy, beginning a lifelong career in the maritime industry. During World War II, Mr. Ford sailed as a cadet midshipman and later as a licensed deck officer aboard merchant vessels in the North Atlantic and the Mediterranean. After his graduation from the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy in 1944, Mr. Ford served aboard merchant vessels for six years. He concluded his seagoing career by sailing as captain of the SS Robin Trent. He was 25. In 1949, he began working for Farrell Lines, an American flag steamship company. He would work for the company for more than 45 years. In 1954, he was cited for heroism after he directed vessels to a place of safety during a pier-side explosion and fire in Brooklyn. Mr. Ford worked in marine operations in New York for more than 20 years before being promoted to vice president of government relations and assuming his new duties in Washington in 1976. He retired in 1995, but continued working as a consultant for the company until 1997. He was a life member, since 1974, of the Marine Society of the City of New York.

Survivors include his wife of 54 years, Julia Cannon Ford of Fairfax; six children, Richard H. Ford Jr. of Fairfax, Charles A. Ford of Portland, Ore., Robert B. Ford of Chantilly, Douglas L. Ford of Sterling, Roger P. Ford of Manassas and Cynthia F. Batchelder of Linden, Va.; 14 grandchildren; and two great-grandchildren.

Washington Post, The (DC)
July 22, 2004