Grand Rapids, Mich. – Gerald Ford’s family and closest friends buried the former president Wednesday in the heart of a city that adored him.
A once-bright winter sun melted into twilight as Ford’s widow, Betty, received from Vice President Dick Cheney the folded American flag that had adorned the coffin of the 38th president. Ford’s death at 93 ended an odyssey that carried him from a humble start in the Midwest to a heartfelt national farewell.
Former President Jimmy Carter, who defeated Ford in 1976 and later became a friend, began and ended his benediction the way he began his inaugural address. Now white-haired, his voice breaking, Carter repeated, “For myself and for our nation, I want to thank my predecessor for all he did to heal our land.”
The memorial service, held at Grace Episcopal Church, where the Fords were married in 1948, brought together a lifetime of Ford friends and acquaintances from the highly placed to the less than mighty.
Among the eulogists was former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, who recalled the calamity of President Richard Nixon’s resignation, which thrust Ford into the Oval Office on Aug. 9, 1974. It was a time when “the pressures were enormous … and the American people were holding their breath, wondering what would happen next.”
When Ford reassured the country, Rumsfeld said, “his special magic” was that few doubted his word.
Historian Richard Norton Smith, who often visited Ford, described him to mourners as “utterly without pretense.” He recalled that in the last chapter of his life, the former president told him, “When I wake up at night and can’t sleep, I think of Grand Rapids.”
The city returned the favor Tuesday and Wednesday as tens of thousands of residents lined the streets to glimpse his passing hearse or stood for hours in the windy cold to view his coffin. It seemed every third mourner had a personal story to share. Often, it was about a good deed that Ford had done, or a recollection that suggested a simpler, more civil time when the people felt closer to those in power.
Eagle Scout Jason Beaton, 18, said his grandmother used to double-date with Ford. Linda Komejan, 52, said Ford interceded to get a driver’s license for her mentally handicapped uncle, allowing him to get back and forth to work. Handmade signs declared, “Welcome Home, Mr. President.”
As the Episcopal service of thanksgiving began, many of the 31 men and women named honorary pallbearers took their seats, among them Cheney and golfer Jack Nicklaus. A maize and blue University of Michigan football blanket marked the pew that former coach Bo Schembechler, who died in November, would have occupied.
After the service, the cortege made its way to the gravesite beside the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library and Museum. The family followed the pallbearers and the coffin, Betty Ford helped from a wheelchair by son Steven Ford and her military escort. As artillery fired a 21-gun salute and 21 military jets staged a precision flyover, the coffin lay beneath an inscription chosen by the Fords: “Lives committed to God, country and love.”
