The rotunda of the U.S. Capitol, that great, sandstone-walled, light-filled hall ringed with statues of the great of American history...and Ronald Reagan marches in, surrounded by his peers. Actually his newly installed statue is unveiled there...
It was a great day and almost a decade in the making. Each of the 50 states is allowed two statues in the Capitol, they are sometimes but not frequently changed, and the changing process is complicated: Both chambers of a state legislature must vote, the governor must agree, the federal government is petitioned. A California congressman told me the hardest part was explaining to the people who the man being replaced was. (Thomas Starr King, a Universalist minister; he helped keep California in the Union during the Civil War.)The Gipper will be the only statue in the rotunda that is smiling. (In Statuary Hall, Will Rogers bears a look of wry amusement.)...
Now that you mention it, he does always seem to be smiling in photos I have seen.
ReplyDeleteI think he made some kind of joke right after being shot, too.
He is interesting that way.
Politically, it seems he has been regarded as somewhat of a "tough guy" but then he also had this light/humorous side that seems to indicate maybe he didn't take himself/life so seriously.