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Dec. 5, 2018 / 2:24 PM GMT / Updated 5:07 PM GMT
By Dartunorro Clark
Former President George H.W. Bush, who died Friday at age 94, is being remembered at a state funeral at Washington National Cathedral on Wednesday.
Two of Bush’s granddaughters, Lauren Bush Lauren and Ashley Walker Bush, began the service, the first funeral honoring a former president since Gerald Ford died in late 2006, with a reading from Isaiah.
Jon Meacham, his biographer, was the first eulogist and told the story of Bush’s plane being shot down during World War II and how he was rescued.
“George Herbert Walker Bush was America’s last great soldier-statesmen,” Meacham said, adding that the former president believed in causes larger than himself. “He believed that to whom much is given, much is expected.”
Meacham drew laughter from the mourners when he recalled how, on the campaign trail, an over-eager Bush once shook the hand of a mannequin in a department store. Realizing his mistake, Bush quipped, “Never know, gotta ask.”
The biographer described Bush as “a loving man with a big, vibrant all-enveloping heart.”
Former Sen. Alan Simpson, a eulogist, called Bush “a class act, from birth to death.”
Brian Mulroney, the former Canadian prime minister who served in that position while Bush was president, also eulogized him.
“I believe it will be said that no occupant of the Oval Office was more courageous, more principled and more honorable that George Herbert Walker Bush,” he said.
Mulroney, like Meacham, also praised the former president for his working unifying Germany after the fall of the Berlin Wall, saying it could not have been done without his leadership. And the former Canadian leader credited Bush for implementing landmark legislation, such as the North American Free Trade Agreement and the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990.
“Let me tell you, that when George Bush was President of the United States of America every single head of government in the world knew that they were dealing with a gentleman and genuine leader one that was distinguished, resolute and brave,” he said.
His body had been lying in state in the Rotunda of the U.S. Capitol since Monday evening, where mourners flocked to pay their respects, until the flag-draped casket was taken from the Capitol to cathedral Wednesday morning and arrived just before the start of the service.
Sitting together in the cathedral front row were President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump and former presidents Bill Clinton, Barack Obama and Jimmy Carter, along with their wives. Trump and Obama shook hands.
Follow the funeral live blog here
Prince Charles of England, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Jordan’s King Abdullah II are some of the foreign dignitaries slated to attend.
About 3,000 people are attending the service.
After the funeral service, Air Force One — temporarily renamed “Special Air Mission 41” in honor of the 41st president — will return Bush’s body to Texas for burial, where a second private funeral is scheduled to take place.
A motorcade will take Bush’s body to Union Pacific Railroad Westfield Auto Facility, where a funeral train will transport the late president’s remains to Texas A&M University in College Station, Texas. He’ll be laid to rest on the grounds of the George H.W. Bush Presidential Library and Museum, near his wife, Barbara, and their daughter Robin, who died of leukemia in 1953 at age 3.
The funeral has been precisely choreographed, with down-to-the-second military rituals for the World War II hero. As many as 4,000 military and Defense Department civilian personnel would be involved in some ceremonial, security or logistical capacity.
Bush, himself, gave the Military District of Washington a 211-page document detailing his funeral arrangements. He requested that a “missing man” formation flyover of fighter jets and that the presidential fanfare, “Hail to the Chief,” not be performed at his burial.
After Bush was briefed in 2011 about his funeral plans and lying in state, the former president asked, “Do you think anyone will come?” Jim McGrath, who was Bush’s spokesman, said on Twitter Tuesday.
Associated Press contributed.