August 28, 2009
Boston Mourns a Kennedy Brother, Again
By LIZ ROBBINS
Thousands of mourners, clapping and waving flags, lined the streets from Cape Cod to downtown Boston on Thursday afternoon, watching as the lengthy funeral procession for Senator Edward M. Kennedy concluded its three-hour journey at the John F. Kennedy Library in Dorchester, Mass.
Mr. Kennedy died late Tuesday at his home in the compound in Hyannis Port, Mass., after battling brain cancer for 15 months. He was 77. His body will lie in repose through 3 p.m. on Friday at the presidential library that Mr. Kennedy helped build to honor his brother.
As Mr. Kennedy’s coffin was taken from the hearse and into the library’s Stephen E. Smith Center, the extended Kennedy family — numbering 85 in the motorcade — emerged from black limousines, sport utility vehicles and a chartered bus. Crowds had been gathering since early morning to enter the public viewing, which was to last from at 6 p.m. to 11 p.m. Thursday and from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. Friday. A private memorial service will be held later Friday at the library.
All day Thursday, the sun sparkled in the late summer sky, lending something of a celebratory air to the otherwise solemn proceedings. Around noon family members began filing into the senator’s house in Hyannis Port for a private Catholic funeral Mass, celebrated by the Rev. Donald MacMillan of Boston College. The Mass ran about 90 minutes longer than expected. When it ended, Kennedy relatives young and old stood behind Mr. Kennedy’s widow, Vicki. They watched in silence as the coffin, draped in the American flag, was put into the hearse just before 2 p.m. Eastern time.
Beside Vicki Kennedy was Jean Kennedy, Mr. Kennedy’s last surviving sibling; immediately behind them were the senator’s four young grandchildren.
Some family members touched the hearse softly as they walked past. A flag flew at half-staff in the center of the circular driveway. When the motorcade finally began its 72-mile journey, the procession was met by people flanking the local streets and the sides of the main highway, Route 3, back to Boston.
In Boston, mourners and tourists of all nationalities and backgrounds mingled, waiting patiently in front of several sites for the motorcade. For some, their connection to Mr. Kennedy was deeply personal, even if they had never met the man.
“I grew up with my dad always telling me that as long as Ted Kennedy was around everything was safe,” said Susan Jackson, 44, a social worker from Worcester, Mass., who went to the Kennedy library early Thursday to be among the first to sign a condolence book for Mr. Kennedy.
By 12:30 p.m., Ms. Jackson was in line a second time to sign the book in her late father’s name. Her father was a bricklayer and active in a union whose events Mr. Kennedy often attended.
“He really fought for the working-class people and that’s exactly what I am,” Ms. Jackson said. “I’m a social worker — I help people too. It was like I lost a part of my family even though I wasn’t related to him, just because growing up he was so dominant in my house.”
In front of St. Stephen’s Church in the city’s North End, the funeral procession’s first destination in the city, Sister Christina Cullen stood near the steps. Mr. Kennedy’s mother, Rose, was baptized at the church, and her funeral Mass was celebrated there.
Sister Cullen, originally from Ireland, took time to praise the Senator as he had once taken time for her.
“He did an awful lot for peace in Ireland and also for immigration issues,” Sister Cullen said. “I met him on the streets a few years ago in Boston and we talked for about five minutes. He always had time for everyone, he asked me what I was doing, how I was doing and all that. Ireland has lost a very important person who used to speak for them, they’ve lost an advocate.”
From the North End, the motorcade crossed over the Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy Greenway, the park Mr. Kennedy helped create, and passed by Faneuil Hall, the colonial-era landmark where Mayor Thomas Menino of Boston rang the bell 47 times — once for each year Mr. Kennedy served in the Senate.
It passed by the State House on Beacon Hill about 4:15 p.m., where about 1,000 people burst into spontaneous applause and waved small American flags as the motorcade turned a corner and drove by 122 Bowdoin Street, where Mr. Kennedy had his first office as an assistant district attorney. His brother John lived on Bowdoin Street while running for Congress in 1946.
Dean Massey, 61, had come to the State House with his son, Michael, his sentiment fueled by a personal connection. Before Mr. Massey had moved to Florida, he and his family lived in Hyannis, about 10 minutes from the Kennedy compound. A computer programmer, Mr. Massey, said he had set up some networks on the compound.
“The Kennedys were involved in the community heavily,” Mr. Massey said. “The family was a symbol for all families to stick together. They went through so much, but they stood by each other.”
He added: “Ted Kennedy has fulfilled the idea that the last will be first.”
Michael Massey, 25, said, “I wanted to catch a glimpse of the motorcade because most presidents don’t get the attention Ted Kennedy has gotten for being a Senator.”
Ecila Gabadon, 53, from Dorchester, brought two of her grandchildren Kryanna Wallace, 11 and Jasseim Wallace, 9 to wait for the procession outside the State House.
Ms. Gabadon, originally from Jamaica, said she came to pay tribute to Mr. Kennedy “because of all the work he’s done for poor black people.”
“He’s for everybody,” she said, “black and white and Hispanic, rich and poor. He’s done a lot for everybody and that’s why I’m here.”
From the State House and Bowdoin Street, the procession passed the John F. Kennedy Federal Building, where Senator Kennedy maintained an office in recent years, and then arrived at the presidential library. The Boston Globe reported that since Mr. Kennedy’s death, museum officials have been hastily constructing an exhibit in the center’s foyer, with photographs and artifacts relating to his speeches, including his 1968 eulogy for his brother Robert F. Kennedy and his Democratic National Convention addresses from 1980 to 2008.
Outside the library mourners left American flags, flowers, a stuffed teddy bear, and a Boston Red Sox cap that someone had placed to mark Mr. Kennedy’s love for his home team.
The family formed a greeting line outside the library, and then was to attend a private service inside the museum. Select Kennedy friends and family, the senator’s aides, as well as relatives of victims of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and the family of a serviceman killed in Iraq, will keep a vigil at the library until a funeral Mass Saturday morning at the Basilica of Our Lady of Perpetual Help in Boston. Mr. Kennedy had befriended the families after their children’s death.
President Obama will deliver a eulogy at the funeral, after which Mr. Kennedy’s body will be flown to Washington. He is to be buried at 5 p.m. Saturday at Arlington National Cemetery outside Washington, near the gravesites of his brothers John and Robert.
Matt Collette, Abby Goodnough and Ariana Green contributed reporting from Boston.
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