Last Act

by Craig Shirley

  Like Mike Deaver, Dennis was also a surrogate son, who worked with the Gipper at the ranch cutting trees, getting on the roof to repair the old tiles, building, tearing down, moving, hauling, just the two of them for hours on end, neither speaking much except to ask for a tool or an opinion. Reagan liked the serenity and normalcy of the ranch and appreciated Dennis’s discreet company. When they ate together they said even less, food flying, and sometimes Nancy would ask Dennis to eat slower in the hopes of inducing her husband to eat slower. In 1976, Reagan took an old trailer from Hollywood to the ranch for Dennis to sleep in while they worked there.66

  Despite his California surfer boy good looks, marked by his tousled reddish-blond hair, he was quiet and reserved. Their closeness had lasted for years and had only deepened, and he was there the last time Reagan was at the ranch in 1997 and Dennis cried then. So there was a good reason why he was not there at Simi at the end of the day, as the sun was setting over the life of Ronald Reagan. Dennis could not take it. The former California Highway Patrolman—a tough and capable man—was home, weeping uncontrollably, stricken beyond words at the loss of his old workmate and ranch friend and father figure.67

  The ceremonies concluded just as the sun was setting over the Pacific with an orange hue, and the moment was too powerful for all present, even touching the most stoic military officer or police officer or Secret Service agent. In the words of the theater, there wasn’t a dry eye in the house.

  After Nancy departed from the funeral proceedings, guests were allowed to form a line to pass by Reagan’s casket and pay their final respects. Mike Deaver was sobbing and crying and grabbed Jim Hooley and hugged him. Deaver later sent Hooley a note saying, “Jim, I apologize. It brought it all home when I saw you, and I lost it.”68

  Reagan’s casket was slowly moved to his final resting place at the top of the hill at the back of the Library. At the top of the hill the sun was starting to set just as there was one last 21-gun salute.

  Per tradition, three of the spent rounds, cartridges, were put inside the folded flag given to Nancy. “The cartridges signify duty, honor, and sacrifice.”69 The 21-gun salute was reserved only for presidents, former presidents, and foreign heads of state. Their firing in three volleys was punctuated by five-second intervals.

  The number three was significant. In Roman times, dirt was cast three times on the grave to symbolize the end of the ceremonies; in later years, three volleys of twenty-one muskets meant a battlefield funeral was over and the fighting could resume.70

  Episcopalians also threw dirt on the coffin as did some evangelicals and Catholics, but Methodists did not.

  It was all too much for even the most cynical, and seven hundred guests all cried tears of sorrow without shame. Millions more around the country and around the world—in living rooms and firehouses and dormitories and churches and community centers and embassies and public housing—were also crying tears of joy, pride, and sorrow. Reagan had always had that effect on people; in life and in death, he still evoked powerful emotions.

  For seven days, the eyes of the world had remained fixed on Nancy Reagan. She was videotaped constantly, photographed constantly, commented on constantly, written about constantly, and watched constantly. She was holding up remarkably well, but as mentioned earlier, was often seen wearing glasses, which in an earlier time neither she nor Ronald Reagan wore in public. It wasn’t anything unusual. Bill Clinton used reading glasses, as did Richard Nixon and JFK. George H. W. Bush had often been seen in public wearing glasses, as was Dwight Eisenhower, as was Lyndon Johnson. It was a matter of taste.

  She’d personally asked former president Bush to speak at the funeral, and like much of the previous week her imprimatur was on most everything. Jackie Kennedy, who had passed away almost exactly ten years earlier, had an equally direct hand in the planning of her husband’s funeral. At the time of the Reagan funeral, Nellie Connally was the only figure still alive in 2004 who was in the presidential car in Dallas that day, the other three having died prematurely. It was also Nellie Connally’s voice that was probably the last thing Kennedy heard when she said, “Mr. President, you certainly can’t say that Dallas doesn’t love you.”71 Some people were recalling the grace with which Jackie Kennedy handled herself during her husband’s funeral as they witnessed Mrs. Reagan’s quiet and elegant comportment, and comparing the two women favorably.

  Simi Valley ranges from seven hundred feet to one thousand feet above sea level and the Reagan Foundation property covered about one hundred acres. Chaparral plants covered the nutrient-starved sandy soil. The original intended location for the Reagan Library with some had been Stanford University, in part because the Hoover Institution was there, but for a variety of reasons—most especially because Reagan didn’t want his library at Stanford, said Robert Higdon, and four years of fighting over politics, of course—the site was later moved to Simi, which was nice for the Reagans as it was approximately halfway between Los Angeles and the ranch near Santa Barbara. They had looked at as many as twenty different locations for the Library before Simi became available because of a generous donation by an admirer who had absolutely no relationship to Reagan.72 Reagan had deeply fond memories of Eureka College but it was never considered for the presidential library, in part because it was far away from where he lived in California.

  The land in Ventura County had been donated by developers Donald Swartz and Gerald Blakeley, and it looked out over the Pacific, about twenty miles to the west, just like the ranch. Its address was 40 Presidential Drive. Swartz was hoping to build a hotel or hotels nearby to support the visitors to the Library. The design of the Library was evocative of the ranch, California Mission style, with the signature curved tile roof and spackled white exterior walls. But while the ranch was tiny—not more than eighteen hundred square feet—the Reagan Library was the largest of all the presidential libraries, with plans for even greater expansion, including an auspicious and enormous pavilion to house the soon-to-be acquired Air Force One.

  The plane had been retired from service, but the Reagan Foundation and Fred Ryan eventually scooped it up knowing what a draw it would be. This Air Force One had gone into service under Richard Nixon and “flew more than a million miles, served seven presidents from . . . Nixon to George W. Bush, and Reagan accounted for 211 of its 445 flights,” according to Duke Blackwood.73

  The Library cost approximately fifty-seven million dollars to build, and was opened in 1991 with a huge gala that included George Bush, Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, and Jimmy Carter, along with all the former First Ladies, including Lady Bird Johnson and excepting Jackie Kennedy Onassis.74 It also housed a full-scale facsimile of the Oval Office as it appeared when Reagan was president, down to the carpeting, the shim under the Resolute desk so Reagan could get his legs into the well, the photos on the credenza, and the little leather saying on his desk, “It can be done.”75 Also, the Remington statues of cowboys and mountain men were in the same locations on either side of the office.

  When the Library was built, the architects wanted to maintain a clear roofline that was not as high as the real White House Oval Office at eighteen feet, six inches. Rather than raising the roof they dug down, so to access the Oval Office at the Reagan Library one had to step down.

  The Reagan Library was nearly as expensive to operate as the Kennedy Library in Boston. Fund-raising was always at a premium in order to keep the doors open and to have sufficient funds for programs and the like, such as centers for learning, a new restaurant, and other amenities.

  Melissa Giller was a pert, popular, and valued longtime member of the Reagan Library staff who knew her subject cold, and when asked if there was anything about Reagan and his first wife, Jane Wyman, at the Library she reportedly quipped, “Somewhere, I know there’s a picture.”76

  With all
the attention focused on the events in Washington for the last day of the Reagan funeral, it was completely overlooked that it was also the twenty-fifth anniversary of the passing of his old friend John Wayne. They’d never made any movies together—after all, he was the “Duke”—but a cowboy buddy film featuring the two would have been fascinating. Still, the men were with different studios and while WWII slowed Reagan’s celluloid career, it only accelerated Wayne’s.

  Already, demand for Reagan memorabilia was heating up on the Internet. His posters had always been popular collector items and became more so after his election in 1980, but now people were bidding for autographs and buttons and photos and statues. A whole industry based on Reagan collectibles was growing.

  The House and the Senate passed resolutions commending the life of President Ronald Reagan, although the House vote was 375–0, which meant sixty members did not vote, and the Senate fell two votes short at 98–0.77 So in neither body was it a unanimous vote.

  It was a busy day in history. It was the anniversary of Margaret Thatcher’s election to a third term as prime minister. It was the anniversary of Jeannette Rankin’s birthday, the first woman elected to the U.S. House, from Montana, even before universal suffrage had passed the Congress, with the support of the Republican Party and the widespread opposition of the Democratic Party.78

  “So ended the nation’s farewell to a man judged by fans and critics alike to have ranked among the most consequential presidents of the past century, a man credited by former British prime minister Margaret Thatcher yesterday with having ’won the Cold War.’ ”79 She also painted a verbal picture of the man she had eulogized, saying, “That cloud has now lifted. He is himself again.”

  Some were tossing around a very profound sentence from her eulogy of earlier in the week that Reagan had also dedicated himself to “the great cause of cheering us all up.”80 Most also felt she gave the best speech but, given the horse race nature of the national media, that was to be expected. Plus, some of them liked to stick it to Bush. “Neither of the Bush men is known as a spellbinding speaker, to put it mildly, but nothing makes Bush the elder look more impressive than being on the same roster with son George,” Tom Shales of the Post acidly wrote.81 He also took a petty shot at Fox News, finding fault in of all things the size of its graphics.

  Mulroney’s comments were also being favorably received. Few before that morning knew what a marvelous speaker and phrase maker he was. No wonder the Irishman Mulroney and the Irishman Reagan got on so well.

  Some in the West during the early 1980s believed communism and democracy were equally valid and viable. This was the school of “moral equivalence.” In contrast, Ronald Reagan saw Soviet communism as a menace to be confronted in the genuine belief that its squalid underpinning would fall swiftly to the gathering winds of freedom. And we know now who was right.82

  He’d done that and more but that was all in the past, all subject to earthly and eternal debates by historians and political scientists and politicians. Reagan had other things on his mind when he left office. In his farewell letter to the American people in late 1994, he’d spoken of going “home”83 in a sweet and tender reference to heaven and eternal life. For Reagan, going to the mountaintop was not just a phrase but an ideal. Going to the mountain had great meaning to his mother, Nelle, active in the Disciples of Christ, and to his father, Jack, a devout Catholic. All Christians believed in going to the mountain, in going home.

  When he thought of or was at his home at the ranch, he’d often quoted Psalm 121:1: “I will lift up mine eyes unto the mountains.”84 Reagan’s favorite poet may have been Robert Service, a big handsome man who wrote manly prose about the West and about mountains. Reagan could quote him verbatim. Indeed, Service had written “The Mountain and the Lake.” “I know a mountain . . . my lake adores my mountain.”85 Ron Reagan said in his eulogy, “He is home now.”86 Everybody knew what the prodigal son meant. His daughter Patti wrote, “My father always believed in going home.”87

  Ronald Wilson Reagan had finally gone home.

  Early the next morning, long, long after the reception following the sunset ceremony and after Nancy Reagan had gone home and after the media and television cameras were gone and all was quiet and still, a small group of Reagan’s devoted advance men drank and made several toasts to the Gipper. They broke out cigars and encircled the crypt, over which had been engraved across a curved stone, “I know in my heart that man is good, that what is right will always eventually triumph, and there is purpose and worth to each and every life.”88 The only other etching was the seal of the president of the United States. Later, a small stone would be added with his name and year of birth and death.

  Reagan probably would have appreciated the lightness and solemnity of the moment. He’d joked often about his age and when the tombs were being built at the Library for him and Nancy, he’d point it out to friends and visitors: “See that over there? That is where I am going to be buried. Not too soon.”89

  Several years earlier, there had also been some laughs among the staff over what phrase Reagan would choose to have engraved over his gravesite. Some joked it would be “There you go again” or “Tear down this wall” or another one of his memorable or jokey lines.90 Reagan would have been right there, laughing.

  The advance men had arranged for ultra-strong spotlights to shine out from the plaza toward the area where remaining camera crews might be set up to blind them as to the post-memorial happenings. Even at the end, the old advance men wanted no attention on themselves and for the focus to be on the president. It was fitting, as it was and as it had always been. Reagan was the star.

  They lit up cigars, had some second drinks, and sat outside the party, unwinding after stressful and sweaty days and sleepless nights. And they reminisced about the past week, the past ten years, and for some the past thirty-plus years, going back to the campaign of 1980 and even before.

  Hours later, after nightfall, the casket was still where Mrs. Reagan had left it, in front of the gravesite. A post-ceremony reception had been held inside the Library but that, too, had been over for hours by now. “A larger group of people—mostly former full time and volunteer White House advance—stayed fairly late into the night enjoying cocktails on the balcony off of the private quarters and telling many, many stories about President Reagan, the ’old days’ and the memorable events of the previous week,” recalled Gary Foster.91

  The script called for the media to be herded out around 8:30 p.m. A private reception with Mrs. Reagan had begun at 7:30 p.m. in the “Private Quarters” and called for her to leave the Library no later than 10:00 p.m. There was also a larger reception in the auditorium, which began at 7:35 p.m. At midnight, the “last guest departs Library” and the “Dig Begins” at 12:10 a.m., again according to the plan.92 One solitary individual had the responsibility for this last and lonely act.

  With most mainstream faiths, it was common practice to have a committal ceremony and then let the family and friends depart. Then the coffin was interred in private. With some Baptists, the gathering remained as the casket was lowered into the ground. Reagan’s funeral would follow tradition and his interment was planned to be a private one. JFK, a Catholic, was interred in private. Long after midnight, nearly everybody was gone, and at the last the planned program was way behind schedule. The military guard had left as had the crowd, and it was now late in the evening and the responsibility for the final ceremony was going to be left to a gravedigger. After the final ceremony, the casket had not yet been placed in the sarcophagus, as the plan had been to inter Reagan in private after everybody had departed.

  The advance men were startled to discover that Reagan’s remains were to be left alone. “What if someone comes in and steals it? Do you want that?” they stormed to the military and Secret Service. “
So you guys are telling me that the president of the United States is going to be out there alone?” But an agent relented and said, “I’ll be there. We won’t leave until the tomb is sealed.”93 The final six Reagan advance men were Gary Foster, Joe Brennan, Grey Terry, Andrew Littlefair, Rick Ahearn, and Jim Hooley. Also present was Duke Blackwood, the head of the archives for the Library. As Foster recalled,

  Duke approached Jim Hooley on the day of the sunset ceremony and asked that he and several of the former White House staff members who had worked on the funeral—at Jim’s choosing—stay to witness the casket lowered down to the mausoleum entrance. Duke wanted to rule out any chance of “conspiracy theories” of a stolen body . . . and he thought it was appropriate to have the people who had worked for President Reagan . . . be there for the last event.

  The workers were escorted in . . . and began to dig the hole to the opening of the tomb. We watched as they finished digging the hole and then opened the large concrete door to the tomb. Duke earlier had expressed concern about the condition of the tomb because it had never been opened since it had been built . . .94

  The old advance men looked inside the crypt and saw some muddy water, so efforts were made to clean it out before the casket was placed inside. It was not a high-tech process. The plan was for the casket to be rolled into place on logs, and as Ahearn said, just like a pharaoh some four thousand years earlier.95 It was now around 2:00 a.m.

  “We watched as they lowered the casket down . . .,” Foster said.96

  After reciting the Lord’s Prayer—led by Ahearn—they formulated their own impromptu ceremony and each threw a small cup of dirt onto the casket. Hooley felt bad they hadn’t planned ahead to have a silver cup to use instead of a Styrofoam cup but it was devised at the last, as advance men often had to do, and somehow seemed appropriate.97 “When the Lord calls me home . . .,” Reagan had written in his Alzheimer’s letter ten years earlier.98