Ronald Reagan's 100th Birthday Celebrated By Nancy Reagan, Beach Boys

SIMI VALLEY, Calif. — Former first lady Nancy Reagan praised her late husband Sunday, laying a wreath on his grave and singing "Happy Birthday" with the Beach Boys as actors, musicians, former advisers and friends paid tribute to Ronald Reagan on the 100th anniversary of his birth.

Nancy Reagan greeted the crowd of about 1,500 invited dignitaries under a tent on the east lawn of the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library on in Simi Valley.

"I know that Ronnie would be thrilled," the 89-year-old said, looking skyward, "and is thrilled, to have all of you share in his 100th birthday. It doesn't seem possible, but that's what it is."

After a crowd including son Ron Reagan and former Vice President Dick Cheney rose to its feet in applause, she shouted "Happy Birthday Ronnie!"

Nancy Reagan has made frequent appearances at the library but rarely speaks.

Former Cabinet secretary and close Reagan friend James Baker III and actor Gary Sinise were among many spoke in praise of the Gipper.

"The Reagan Revolution did not end when he left office 22 years ago, or when he left Nancy and all of us on June the 5th, 2004," said Baker. "Yes, the revolution was about a man, but it was really much more. The lessons Ronald Reagan taught us about freedom, and common sense and self-reliance remain every bit as true today as they were then."

Lee Greenwood sang his signature version of "God Bless the USA," a Reagan favorite, and several others, including country artists including Lonestar and Amy Grant, also performed.

A group of FA-18 fighter jets based on the USS Ronald Reagan flew over the crowd.

Reagan, the nation's 40th chief executive, was 93 when he died after a long battle with Alzheimer's disease.

The event was the culmination of a week of tributes to the former president at and around his presidential library, including speeches from former Vice President Dick Cheney and Sarah Palin.

In Illinois, where Reagan was born and spent the first two decades of his life, hundreds celebrated at a birthday party at the Tampico Historical Society, eating cake with a picture of the president and touring the nearby restored apartment where he was born in 1911.

Reagan spent his first 21 years in Illinois. He grew up in Dixon, Monmouth, spent some time in Chicago and attended college in Eureka.

A special church service was dedicated to him at First Christian Church in Dixon, where Reagan was baptized.

Comments

[Quasi-Stellar Object]

09:50 AM on 02/08/2011

How nice. They forgot to request permission to display the AIDS quilt.

Oh wait...they didn't forget at all.

[Ellen Crescenta]

09:55 AM on 02/09/2011

LET'S TALK ABOUT TODAY, HIV in Africa, Eastern Europe and the renewed rise of HIV infection rates in the west, including the US, where rates of new infection have now reached alarmingly high levels has absolutley NOTHING to do with Reagan and what happened OVER 35 years ago.

Many factors are at play, to dismiss it all on a man who is dead and lving in the past is irresponsi­ble and ignorant.

Try doing the research and understand­ing the variables before loudly trumpeting your nonsense and passing the buck

[tuneone52]

08:58 AM on 02/08/2011

All these people who think Reagan was a great President? How soon they forget the fact he was an F.B.I. INFORMER, COMMITED FELONY, SELL-OUT, AND PUT THIS COUNTRY IN A DOWNWARD SPIRAL UNLESS YOU WAS RICH AND IN THAT CASE THE GREATEST TRANSFER OF WEALTH WAS ON HIS WATCH, YES A GREAT PRESIDENT IF YOU HAPPEN TO BE IN THE TOP 2 PERCENT OF THE RICHEST PEOPLE. Oh how soon people forget.

[eddiefi]

06:26 AM on 02/08/2011

OK folks. one member of a band still gouging people to support them by using the name of a band that does not exist anymore is so republican like. Fool the people into thinking they are getting what they want. Mike Love is the only original left in the band and has milked this cow for all it is worth. New members are John Stamos? None of the Wilson brothers are in the band and Al Jardine is not in the band. Maybe they should go on tour with Buddy Holly and The Cricketts, Otis Redding and Rick Nelson as all of these guys being dead should not affect their ticket sales at all as there are enough people out there who would not know the difference anyway

[kaptaintripps]

09:44 PM on 02/07/2011

Woo-hoo. Throwing up, here. Do any of these people actually read any history?

[Gus Adaire]

08:24 AM on 02/08/2011

You mean lib alternative history?

[RealityBaseCamp]

08:15 PM on 02/07/2011

I was at the last 2 Beach Boys 4th of July concerts at the Washington Monument before Nancy banned them for not being American enough. Maybe they've forgiven her. I haven't.

[OlongapoEd]

08:49 PM on 02/07/2011

Okay, was it Watt, as someone said down below, or Nancy? Enquiring minds want to know. :-/ Seriously, I've always equated the common enthusiasm for the Beach Boys with the common enthusiasm for Reagan. Yeah, they did a few good songs, but by and large, they struck me as self-absorbed surfer/frat boy types. All that stuff about hanging out at the beach and cruising for burgers in daddy's new car meant nothing to me. It was big with the "popular" students at high school though. :-/ And then there was "Be True to Your School", which I have mentioned earlier (Brian may have written the lyrics, but Mike Love seems to be the one who keeps doing it). Somebody got snippy and insisted that there is nothing wrong with the lyrics. There's nothing wrong with mindless juvenile provincialism? I knew that type of mentality all too well when I was in high school. In effect, I was expected to hate students at other schools, students who had done *nothing* to me. And I see far too many people who have continued with such juvenile provincialism into their (so-called) "adult" lives.

[RealityBaseCamp]

12:28 AM on 02/08/2011

It was Watt who gave the order, but I remember it coming from Nancy.

[Fritzzler]

05:46 PM on 02/07/2011

This man (Ronald) started the downfall of America. By killing the air traffic controllers unions he started the process of destroying the middle class. Has the middle class died America died.
The dream died and you can see the result.

[Supersteel]

06:13 PM on 02/07/2011

The controllers broke the law. Goodbye!

[kimbanyc]

06:19 PM on 02/07/2011

FANNED FROM NYC

[mpano66]

05:45 PM on 02/07/2011

Huh. Responses are about what I'd expect from such a Leftist site. I really love the way the left tries to rewrite history.

You folks may want to check your facts. Try the Treasury first. Per US Treasury numbers, during Reagan's presidency the rich DID get richer....but so did the poor. The highest income brackets, while paying a lower percent of their income in base taxes, actually carried a heavier tax burden than they did before or since...and the poorest Americans carried a lower tax burden. Reagan saved the economy, after the nightmare that was "Jimmah". I know it torques the panties of the most liberal of Americans when they get their faces rubbed into the facts, but tough. Truth is truth.

Our nation could most definitely use a man like Reagan again.

[cdouglas]

07:40 PM on 02/07/2011

Actually we couldn't, he increased the national debt tremendously.

[AnnArky]

08:35 PM on 02/07/2011

You're absolutely Right, we do need a man like Reagan again if for no other reason than to speed up this slooooow death we've be experiencing since Shrub came and went.

[sixx]

05:12 PM on 02/07/2011

Reagan to prosecutor Walsh,

"It's like I wasn't president at all," Reagan said in response to one inquiry."

[kimbanyc]

04:00 PM on 02/07/2011

Reagan's Legacy;
1) Increased the National Debt by 189% ($998 billion to $2.6 trillion)
no one else comes close.
2) Converted millions of highpaying union jobs into low paying nonunion jobs.
3) Cut spending on healthcare leaving exservicemen, disabled people,
and old without any support and left to rot on streets.
4) Doubled the number of poor in the country.
5) Turned the US from the major exporter of manufactured goods in the
world to major importer of manufactured goods.
6) Turned US from a net importer of raw natural resources into a
nation that exported raw natural resources (just like a third-world
country).
7) Funded terrorists and tried to trade arms for hostages.
8) Funded and added Saddam with his WMD.
9) Reagan encouraged corruption, allowing companies to sell $25 toilet
seats to military for $360 and $8 hammers for $120.
10) Reagan cut income taxes on working class but increased payroll
taxes and mandated contributions to Medicare and Social Security
but did so in such a way that top 1% paid 15% less than they did
before by limiting their deductions on first $61,000 but the
working poorest had theirs increased 15%.
11) Reagan took a staggering 436 vacation days at his ranch in 8 years.
12) Allowed Rupert Murdoch to circumvent the immigration laws to
purchase American media sources.
13) Ignored the impending AIDS epidemic because it mostly affected Them People.
14) Encouraged the Evangelicals to become Political and Partisan.

[LonosCurse]

05:36 PM on 02/07/2011

No birthday cake for you!

[norsegirl]

05:45 PM on 02/07/2011

You forgot that a waged war on the American cattle rancher and allowed corporations to run them out of business and buy up their land for pennies on the dollar.

[kimbanyc]

05:48 PM on 02/07/2011

AND ON AND ON AND ON

[srivers]

04:00 PM on 02/07/2011

The original trailer for "Hellcats of the Navy" (1957):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FkWXjCnASCk

[Supersteel]

02:12 PM on 02/07/2011

Happy Birthday, President Reagan. My childhood hero. I will never forget the comfort I felt with the Challenger speech you gave.

[Supersteel]

02:11 PM on 02/07/2011

Why are people surprised about the Beach Boys? they performed at one of George HW Bushs inaugaration celebrations.
 
Gary Sinise is also fairly outspoken on his politics.
 
I mean, right now, Reagan has approval ratings second only to JFK in all recent polls. So you, know, most people like him other than the most liberal people in the country. It is what it is.

[skatscan]

05:35 PM on 02/07/2011

That's sad that polls put Reagan under a man who only served the presidency for less than 3 years about 50 years ago.

[Supersteel]

06:13 PM on 02/07/2011

they put all 43 other presidents under JFK. That's what happens when you get assassinated and become a martyr in peoples lifetimes.

[cdouglas]

07:41 PM on 02/07/2011

The Beach Boys are not The Beach Boys without Brian Wilson, and any Beach Boys fan knows that.

[Supersteel]

08:39 AM on 02/08/2011

Well he went nuts, so what can you do?

[Supersteel]

02:07 PM on 02/07/2011

It was a very moving ceremony.  

[cdouglas]

07:41 PM on 02/07/2011

Yes, I had to go to the bathroom about 5 times.

[UpUpandAway]

08:16 PM on 02/07/2011

hahahahahah.... fanned.

[doctorjay48]

01:10 PM on 02/07/2011

did his idea of freedom include all the dead people piled up as a result of supporting all the dictators
including Saddam Hussein and the Argentine regime who threw people out of planes to their death. These guys were feted at the white house. Some idea of freedom?

[Velvettazz]

12:35 PM on 02/07/2011

Raegan was the worst President we ever had. So now what, we do a little skeleton rattling and get misty eyed over all the mistakes he made and sing kumbya stuffing him back in the box until next year? or the next 25 years when Nancy's bones will shake with him? Gimme a break!

[LonosCurse]

05:41 PM on 02/07/2011

Why does everything have to be the worst or the best? Most historians would say that Buchanan was the worst. You really can't compare him to a guy led us to the doorstep of the Civil War. And canonizing doesn't seem right either, Sarah. Besides what does she know? It's not like she could see him from her porch. He was mediocre, but he had his moments.