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 Former President Reagan dies at age 93
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Reagan dies with family by his side
Body of ex-president expected to be brought to D.C. for state funeral
MSNBC News Services
Updated: 8:04 p.m. ET June 05, 2004LOS ANGELES - Ronald Reagan, the cheerful crusader who devoted his presidency to winning the Cold War, trying to scale back government and making people believe it was “morning again in America,” died Saturday after a long twilight struggle with Alzheimer’s disease. He was 93.
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“My family and I would like the world to know that President Ronald Reagan has passed away after 10 years of Alzheimer’s disease at 93 years of age. We appreciate everyone’s prayers,” Nancy Reagan said in a statement.
Nancy Reagan, along with children Ron and Patti Davis, were at the couple’s Los Angeles home when Reagan died at 1 p.m. PDT of pneumonia complicated by Alzheimer’s disease, said Joanne Drake, who represents the family. Son Michael arrived a short time later, she said.
In Paris, President Bush called Reagan’s death “a sad day for America.”
The U.S. flag over the White House — along with flags elsewhere — was lowered to half-staff. At ballparks and at the Belmont Stakes, there were moments of silence.
Reagan’s body was expected to be taken to his presidential library and museum in Simi Valley, Calif., and then flown to Washington to lie in state in the Capitol Rotunda. His funeral was expected to be at the National Cathedral, an event likely to draw world leaders. The body was to be returned to California for a sunset burial at his library.
The White House was told his health had taken a turn for the worse in the last several days.
The president planned to participate in D-Day ceremonies in Normandy on Sunday and then fly back to the United States for an international economic summit in Georgia.
A White House spokeswoman said it was not known at this point whether Bush would change his travel plans because of Reagan’s death.
Alzheimer's Disease
Five years after leaving office, the nation’s 40th president told the world in November 1994 that he had been diagnosed with the early stages of Alzheimer’s, an incurable illness that destroys brain cells. He said he had begun “the journey that will lead me into the sunset of my life.”
Reagan lived longer than any U.S. president, spending his last decade in the shrouded seclusion wrought by his disease, tended by his wife, Nancy, whom he called Mommy, and the select few closest to him. Now, Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton are the surviving ex-presidents.
Although fiercely protective of Reagan’s privacy, the former first lady let people know his mental condition had deteriorated terribly. Last month, she said: “Ronnie’s long journey has finally taken him to a distant place where I can no longer reach him.”
Reagan’s oldest daughter, Maureen, from his first marriage, died in August 2001 at age 60 from cancer. Three other children survive: Michael, from his first marriage, and Patti Davis and Ron from his second.
Over two terms, from 1981 to 1989, Reagan reshaped the Republican Party in his conservative image, fixed his eye on the demise of the Soviet Union and Eastern European communism and, with a Congress that was largely controlled by Democrats through much of his two terms, helped triple the national debt to $3 trillion in his competition with the other superpower.
The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report
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