A Dec. 31 article incorrectly said that former defense secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld was present as an honorary pallbearer when former president Gerald R. Ford's casket arrived in Washington to lie in state. Rumsfeld was not there^ , because his plane had been ^ was delayed.
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A Solemn Homecoming
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"In the nation's darkest hour, Gerald Ford lived his finest moment. . . . He knew the road to national healing began with the courage to forgive," said Sen. Ted Stevens (R-Alaska), the Senate's president pro tem, who also spoke at the state funeral.
Outside the Capitol, hundreds of people waited to pay their respects. Some waited five hours or longer before getting into the Rotunda late in the night.
They included Becky Reese, 47, and her husband, Ralph, 48, of West Chester, Ohio, who prolonged a stay in Washington to attend the viewing. They were with their sons, Benjamin, 12, and Evan, 9. They planned to drive home as soon as they left the Rotunda last night.
Becky Reese sat on the ground with her back against the metal grates. Her children were huddled against her: "We decided this would be a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity." She said her children saw the services for former president Ronald Reagan on television and said they wanted to be on hand when Ford was honored.
Her husband said that Ford was the first presidential candidate he ever voted for, and he fondly recalled the Ford years as calmer than the presidencies before and after it. "There was just no real big news," he said. "You didn't have Iran. You didn't have Watergate. It was quiet. No news was good news."
As midnight approached, the crowd diminished, but people continued to come.
The day began with private services at Ford's church in California. Then his body was carried aboard an official presidential jumbo jet for the cross-country flight to Andrews Air Force Base.
The plane arrived in darkness, and Ford's flag-covered casket was carried from the aircraft to a black hearse by eight uniformed service members.
Black artillery pieces fired a 21-gun salute, belching smoke that drifted like fog across the tarmac, as a military band played "Hail to the Chief" and "America (My Country 'Tis of Thee)", which had been requested by the family.
Standing by in the evening chill were several dozen honorary pallbearers, including former secretaries of state Henry A. Kissinger and James A. Baker III, former defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld, former transportation secretary William T. Coleman Jr. and Cheney, who had once been Ford's chief of staff.
Once the music stopped, the quiet was broken only by a long roll of drums and the shouted orders of the military commanders.
Betty Ford, looking tiny on the arm of white-gloved Army Maj. Gen. Guy C. Swann 3d, watched as the casket was carried by and then took a seat in a limousine, where she could be seen wiping her face with a handkerchief.
