Ford Model Agency founder Eileen Ford has passed away due to health complications. She was 92.
Arielle Baran, a spokeswoman for Ford Models in Manhattan, told Bloomberg on Thursday that Ford's death was caused by complications from osteoporosis and meningioma, a tumor that affects the brain or spinal cord.
The legendary fashion industry icon is credited with revolutionizing the modeling business and launching the careers of many supermodels, including Candice Bergen, Lauren Hutton and Jane Fonda.
Ford also trained and represented Cheryl Tiegs, Ali MacGraw, Margaux Hemingway, Sharon Stone, Christie Brinkley, Jerry Hall, Melanie Griffith, Kim Basinger, Beverly Johnson and Brooke Shields.
Brinkley took to her Instagram account to share a photo with Ford and respond to the sad news.
"I was lucky to call Eileen Ford my agent," Brinkley wrote. "She was the best in the business. She saw something in me and with her brilliant business acumen, her knowledge, experience, and personal touch she took me from Malibu surfer girl and guided my career thru covers and contracts to places I never imagined like the Broadway stage! The last time I ever saw Eileen was in this photo ...I was so proud that a true living legend had come to see me perform in the play 'Chicago' and I wanted to do my best performance for her because it was the least I could do for someone who gave me the world. My heartfelt condolences and love to her cherished family."
A former model herself, Ford started her business in 1946 with her husband, Jerry Ford, who was in charge of the agency's finances.
In her career that spanned more than six decades, Ford has been known to demand the highest level of professionalism from her models, and her agency became a recruiting ground for Hollywood. She is known for having an eye for talent, picking over the many young women who flock to her office, putting the chosen ones on strict diets and firing those who have a penchant for late-night parties.
"I think our success came from Eileen's energy and her bluntness and, to some extent, her comfort with confrontation," Jerry Ford said in 1997. "A fortune teller once told her if she wasn't an agent, she should be, because all the stars pointed that way. She's always loved to tell people what to do."
Ford is survived by her four children, Katie, Jamie, Gerard William Ford Jr. and Lacey; eight grandchildren; five great grandchildren; and her brother, William Otte. Jerry Ford died in 2008.
