George H.W. Bush’s long, extraordinary life

Lucky people like me have been at once saddened and emotionally enriched in the past week by the ceremony surrounding the funeral of President George H.W. Bush.

Saddened because the country lost a genuine hero; uplifted because his death brought out in detail the stories not just of Bush but of his marvelous American family.

What a striking family story! Too often, there are troubling elements at the end of a long life that somehow damage the legacy. To err is human, etc. But there are no discernible asterisks beside the Bush story. His was a life of service to his country and utmost devotion to family. Could there be a better legacy?

It didn’t have to be that way. His family was wealthy, and he probably could have taken the easiest way in everything he did. Bush took the hardest way and relished it.

I’ll not run down the glittering highlights of his life – that would be pointless – but one episode, to me, stands as the best example of the concrete character of both Bushes, George and Barbara.

The most difficult thing George and wife Barbara ever had to face in their 73 years together, I’m thinking, was the death of their 3-year-old daughter Robin. As the father of a large family (10 children with wife Ethel) I think I know about family crises. I have not, however, experienced the death of a child. There were close calls, but never a death.

George and Barbara went through it and, because they relied and leaned completely on each other, they got through it.

The goodbye to the former president was grand, as it should have been. The Bush funeral train and processions were touching, just as others before them had been. It reminded me of others.

When Abraham Lincoln’s funeral procession passed his window in New York City in 1865, Theodore Roosevelt was said to have been deeply affected.

He was six years old. Many years later, TR, who would die at age 60, still talked about the power and impact of it.

It is good for our country to stop everything and salute men who served in the highest office with honor. Bush 41 was surely that.

The funerals of other U.S. presidents, besides Lincoln, have also been marked by such displays of respect. Franklin D. Roosevelt’s sudden death in Warm Springs, Ga. at age 63, shocked the nation, even though pictures of FDR showed him to be gaunt and obviously in failing health. He had just begun his fourth term as president, having led the country through the Great Depression and most of World War II.

If you have seen the film of the train trip carrying FDR’s remains north from Georgia to Hyde Park, N.Y. you remember the great throngs of silent, saddened people who lined the railroad tracks or stood, heads bowed, in the fields in which they were toiling.

When John F. Kennedy was assassinated, the dark cloud of sorrow and sadness that gripped the country was palpable and the images of many of the gripping and poignant scenes – such as the famous one of three-year-old John saluting casket, remain fresh in the memories of those who were watching.

G.H.W. Bush was not assassinated or ill. He was 94 years old, and had lived a long and extraordinary life. It was not a surprise. Yet the impact was great, and I believe, that was because of the family. George W. Bush never had a better moment than when he stood before a packed church and, with great and genuine emotion, eulogized his father.

We’ve lost a very good, strong man who taught us plenty about duty, country, loyalty and family. I believe we sent him off in proper style; and all who consider themselves family men and women, are proud of that.