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• ford
  ford

  noun

  a place where a river or other body of water is shallow enough to be crossed by wading.
• Ford
  Ford

  noun

  Elizabeth Bloomer Betty, 1918–2011, U.S. First Lady 1974–77 (wife of Gerald R. Ford).

ford

¹ American  

[fawrd, fohrd] / fɔrd, foʊrd /

noun

• fords
  plural

1. a place where a river or other body of water is shallow enough to be crossed by wading.

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verb (used with object)

• fords,
  present (3rd person singular)
• forded,
  past participle,  past
• fording
  present participle

1. to cross (a river, stream, etc.) at a ford.

Ford ² American  

[fawrd, fohrd] / fɔrd, foʊrd /

noun

1. Elizabeth Bloomer Betty, 1918–2011, U.S. First Lady 1974–77 (wife of Gerald R. Ford).

2. Ford Madox Ford Madox Hueffer, 1873–1939, English novelist, poet, critic, and editor.

3. Gerald R(udolph, Jr.) Leslie Lynch King, Jr., 1913–2006, U.S. political leader: congressman 1948–73; vice president 1973–74; 38th president of the U.S. 1974–77.

4. Guy Stanton, 1873–1963, U.S. historian, educator, and editor.

5. Henry, 1863–1947, U.S. automobile manufacturer.

6. John, 1586?–c1640, English playwright.

7. John Sean O'Feeney, 1895–1973, U.S. film director.

8. a male given name.

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Ford ¹ British  

/ fɔːd /

noun

1. Ford Maddox (ˈmædəks) original name Ford Madox Hueffer . 1873–1939, English novelist, editor, and critic; works include The Good Soldier (1915) and the war tetralogy Parade's End (1924–28).

2. Gerald R ( udolph ). 1913–2006, US politician; 38th president of the US (1974–77)

3. Harrison . born 1942, US film actor. His films include Star Wars (1977) and its sequels, Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) and its sequels, Bladerunner (1982), Clear and Present Danger (1994), and What Lies Beneath (2000)

4. Henry . 1863–1947, US car manufacturer, who pioneered mass production

5. John . 1586–?1639, English dramatist; author of revenge tragedies such as 'Tis Pity She's a Whore (1633)

6. John , real name Sean O'Feeney . 1895–1973, US film director, esp of Westerns such as Stagecoach (1939) and She Wore a Yellow Ribbon (1949)

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ford ² British  

/ fɔːd /

noun

1. a shallow area in a river that can be crossed by car, horseback, etc

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verb

1. (tr) to cross (a river, brook, etc) over a shallow area

Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• fordable
  adjective
• unfordable
  adjective
• unforded
  adjective

Inflected Forms

Nouns

• fords
  plural

Participles

• fording
  present
• forded
  past

Conjugated Forms

Present

• ford
  simple
• fords
  simple
• have forded
  perfect
• has forded
  perfect
• am fording
  progressive
• are fording
  progressive
• is fording
  progressive
• have been fording
  perfect progressive
• has been fording
  perfect progressive

Past

• forded
  simple
• had forded
  perfect
• was fording
  progressive
• were fording
  progressive
• had been fording
  perfect progressive

Future

• will ford
  simple
• will have forded
  perfect
• will be fording
  progressive
• will have been fording
  perfect progressive

Etymology

Origin of ford

before 900; Middle English (noun), Old English; cognate with Old Frisian forda, German Furt; akin to Old Norse fjǫrthr, fare, port ¹

Explanation

When you’re out hiking in the wilderness, you may have to ford a river if there’s no bridge. Roll up your pant legs because you'll have to wade through the water at a shallow point. The verb ford describes crossing a body of water on foot at a shallow point or driving across it in a vehicle. The idea is that you’re not using a bridge or a boat to cross the water. Ford also has a noun form, meaning a shallow point in a river or stream. So if you ever have to ford a river, make sure you cross at the ford — the shallow point — or you could get very wet.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

ford Ford fords forded fording

It is thought the former wing's vehicle was swept away while he tried to drive across a ford during Storm Darragh.

From BBC ● Sep. 22, 2025

A third man, in his 80s, died after driving into a ford in Colne, Lancashire.

From BBC ● Nov. 26, 2024

According to a council report, an average of 1,900 vehicles used to go down Rufford Lane every day before the ford closed.

From BBC ● Feb. 3, 2024

He says it now needs doing again in order to prevent the ford flooding as often as it does.

From BBC ● Feb. 3, 2024

One day our great-uncle Ser Harbert told me to try a different ford.

From "A Clash of Kings" by George R.R. Martin

During contract talks in 2023, Fain called targeted strikes of certain auto plants, such as the Kentucky facility where Ford produces its most profitable trucks.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 9, 2026

Flowers, who grew up in Las Vegas and Utah and who shares three sons with his wife, spoke about the album in his dressing room last month a few hours before the Ford show.

From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 9, 2026

The girl was a rear seat passenger in a VW Polo involved in a collision with a Ford Ranger at about 17:30 on Wednesday on the A831 between Drumnadrochit and Cannich, south of Inverness.

From BBC ● Oct. 8, 2026

For Crescent Energy, the buy bolsters its Eagle Ford position, adding top-tier inventory and meaningful scale directly adjacent to its existing operations.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 8, 2026

Ford laughs so hard he almost chokes on his food, and Mom gets mad.

From "Free Lunch" by Rex Ogle

There are regularly stories of drivers who end up going through floods, fords and teetering on the edge of canals after following their GPS systems, prompting warnings about the dangers of slavishly following the route.

From BBC ● Feb. 21, 2026

The reroute required building a small bridge and establishing new creek fords.

From Seattle Times ● Sep. 21, 2022

“The planned route is at least 135 miles long, and depending on the?deviations, avoiding avalanche risks, finding safe river fords, and?wandering in the trees, it could be as much as 150 miles,” Williams said.

From Washington Times ● Feb. 22, 2016

You have to ford numerous rivers, and the Shoshones, Pawnees and Sioux, were extremely adept at helping the pioneers make these fords.

From National Geographic ● Jul. 12, 2015

Then they all heard the sound of hoofs, and at the same moment they saw dark shapes coming swiftly on the path from the fords.

From "The Return of the King" by J.R.R. Tolkien

He has picked his way across roads and railways, forded local streams and swum across the River Danube.

From BBC ● Sep. 22, 2025

Akil continues down the road that Blume's 1975 novel forded, accurately capturing adolescence's hidden longing and confusion.

From Salon ● May 21, 2025

Klemperer and his colleagues, including collaborators in China, traversed dirt roads and forded streams to collect samples from some 200 natural springs across nearly 1000 kilometers of southern Tibet.

From Science Magazine ● Jan. 9, 2024

Undermanned and outgunned Californios attacked U.S. troops as they forded the San Gabriel River.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 25, 2020

If I forded the river, I’d hit a tributary that would lead me to Ikwa, the village nearest my mother’s site.

From "Endangered" by Eliot Schrefer

Ragnar, the kind of fellow for whom riding a horse and fording a river are second nature, despises Lucas from the moment they meet, and the antipathy proves more than mutual.

From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 9, 2023

Scotty Jalbert, emergency services manager for San Luis Obispo County, said river crossings can be deceiving and people can run into trouble after successfully fording them several times.

From Seattle Times ● Jan. 11, 2023

Baumbach, working on a larger scale than he has before, pulls off a few fine cinematic coups, one of them involving that station wagon fording a swollen stream.

From New York Times ● Nov. 23, 2022

He described fording knee-deep mud in the jungles of the Darién Gap linking Colombia and Panama.

From Washington Post ● Sep. 25, 2022

A great white cow was fording through the river of traffic, vehicles parting to let it through.

From "The Bridge Home" by Padma Venkatraman

Related Words

• cruise
• cut across
• navigate
• pass over
• ply
• sail
• span
• traverse