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Editorial: Enormity of burying a president
Op-Ed · October 24, 2014
Reading through the 30-page record of the state funeral for President Herbert C. Hoover, one might notice what is NOT mentioned.
The report is not a eulogy nor a summary, does not include details of his years as a mining engineer, his accomplishments as president, his efforts to save the starving in Belgium and greater Europe, the scores of books he authored, the number of buildings or other structures named after him, nor any of the other history-making decisions of his 90 years on earth. In this report is not even the text of one speech given in Hoover’s honor.
Reading the 30-page report, there is actually very little in there to tell you what kind of man he was. It gives his age, that he was the 31st president, that he lived in the Waldorf Astoria Hotel and died on Oct. 20, 1964, shortly before noon. In fact, all of the personal information about Hoover in this report could fit into about half a page.
The report primarily tells us what OTHERS did to remember HIM.
Further, the details of the six calendar days — the day he died to the day he was buried in West Branch on Oct. 25 — still gloss over quite a few details to present the account.
How many people, after their death, can generate another 30 pages in a book with very little said about their character, their resume, their contributions to society, or how much they were loved and adored?
Ceremonies for marking Hoover’s death were located in New York City, Washington D.C., and West Branch. Arrangements were largely the responsibility of three generals in the U.S. Army: Lt. Gen. Robert W. Porter Jr., Maj. Gen. Philip C. Wehle and Lt. Gen. Charles G. Dodge. That detail alone tells us a lot about the value of Hoover to the United States, and quite a bit about the enormity of giving him a proper “Last Salute.”
Among those in attendance at one of those locations were President Lyndon Johnson, Hubert Humphrey, Barry Goldwater, Thomas Dewey, Richard Nixon and Robert F. Kennedy, not to mention numerous members of the Hoover family. Some 670 members from all six military branches contributed in some way to the New York ceremony.
About 150 from his family plus numerous others took up an entire train from Pennsylvania Station to D.C. Some 237 members of the military were involved — from clergy to honor guard to caisson detail to the band and site control — just to welcome their arrival in Union Station.
Eighteen limousines and a hearse were core to the procession, as well as 25 military and veterans organizations. The main procession in D.C. involved 1,747 members of the military with a band playing “Hail to the Chief” and the hymn “The Light of God is Falling.” The distance between each vehicle or marching group was counted out to exactly six or 12 steps away from the next.
At the U.S. Capitol, 305 members of the military helped bearing flags, standing guard, ushering or guiding traffic. The path from the steps of the capitol building to the rotunda was laid out exactly. Seating in the rotunda was designated for Congress, the Supreme Court, the president’s cabinet, the president and vice president and their families, an honor guard and members of the media, and more. President Johnson placed a wreath by the casket.
The departure ceremony from the capitol included another 265 members of the military, including 15 just for floral detail, on way to the Washington National Airport. Another 403 military members met them at the airport.
Arriving in Cedar Rapids, 119 officers and 739 enlisted men, many creating a human barrier around the tarmac, met the airplane that carried Hoover’s body.
In West Branch, 16 limousines and the hearse filled two-thirds of the loop road at the base of the burial site and designated areas were set aside for the press, body bearers, the Army band, security and the national colors. The loop road area was restricted and no one was allowed inside the circle. Yet the official formation stood in the middle of some 75,000 people who came to watch the native son of West Branch be buried within site of his birthplace cottage. The entourage, minus Hoover’s body, left West Branch at 3:35 p.m.
The report ends with this sentence: “At sunset on 25 October, a winding line of people still was moving slowly past the final resting place of the nation’s thirty-first President.”
This was 50 years ago. Hoover, who left this city as an orphan, had returned home as so much more.
So much more.
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