Path: bloom-picayune.mit.edu!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!americast.com!americast.com!americast-post
Newsgroups: americast.wpost
From: americast-post@AmeriCast.Com
Organization: American Cybercasting
Approved: americast-post@AmeriCast.com
Subject: Dorothy Walker Bush Dies at Age 91; President's Mother, 'Righteous Lady'<By
Date: Fri, 20 Nov 92 04:42:00 EST
Message-ID: <33.1992Nov20.044200@AmeriCast.com>

Dorothy Walker Bush Dies at Age 91; President's Mother, 'Righte-
ous Lady'<By Ann Devroy<Washington Post Staff Writer=

Dorothy Walker Bush, 91, the mother of President Bush and ma-
triarch of the Bush family, died yesterday at her home in
Greenwich, Conn. The president had made a rushed trip to visit
her yesterday afternoon after learning Wednesday night she had
suffered a stroke.  The wife of a senator, Mrs. Bush lived to see
her son inaugurated the 41st president of the United States.
Seated on the inaugural platform four years ago, she smiled as he
bent to kiss her and tell reporters, "Many of our family are
here, and they all, as does this son, worship the ground she
walks on." In his autobiography, Bush called his mother and fa-
ther, the late Prescott Bush, the "most important people in my
life," and he spoke often of his mother with love and pride. Dur-
ing his years as vice president and president, he visited her
often at the homes she maintained in Florida in the winter, in
Greenwich where the president grew up, and at the family compound
in Kennebunkport, Maine.

Mrs. Bush died shortly after 5 p.m. at the Greenwich house, where
family members had gathered after her stroke on Wednesday. The
president had been informed of her illness by his sister, Nancy
Ellis, and left Washington in a small Air Force jet yesterday
morning for a rushed visit.  He was back in the White House when
she died.

The president will attend family memorial services in Greenwich
on Monday, White House spokesman Marlin Fitzwater said.

Although Mrs. Bush had been in declining health after suffering a
series of small strokes and pneumonia, her 90th birthday in July
1991 brought the huge Bush family together in Kennebunkport for
an extended celebration. All of the Bush children spoke of her
with awe and affection, echoing the president's words in his au-
tobiography about the old-fashioned upbringing his father and
mother had offered their four sons and daughter, an upbringing
that blended "generous measures" of love and discipline with an
emphasis on good sportsmanship.

In a book on the Bush family values by author Doug Wead, Jeb
Bush, one of the president's sons, called his grandmother "a
pretty righteous lady," and Marvin, another son, said her influ-
ence on his father "trickled down" to the grandchildren in an em-
phasis on self-discipline and proper behavior.

In the same book, Mrs. Bush said she had never heard her son ex-
press interest in being president until virtually the day he an-
nounced his candidacy in 1980. She told Wead, "I taught my chil-
dren to be kind. I taught my children the Golden Rule. I taught
them love."

President-elect Clinton said last night he had telephoned the
president to express condolences.

In a statement, Clinton said Mrs. Bush was "a remarkable woman
whom Hillary, Chelsea and I had the good fortune to meet in Maine
several years ago.

"Throughout his life, President Bush has put his family first,"
Clinton said, adding that the Bush family was "in our thoughts
and prayers."

Mrs. Bush was born in Kennebunkport to a wealthy Ohio business-
man, George Herbert Walker, who like the president, was an avid
athlete. It is for Mrs. Bush's father that the president was
named. She grew up in St. Louis and attended school in Connecti-
cut, where she met and married Prescott Bush in 1921. The family
settled in Connecticut in 1926, two years after the birth of
George Bush, their second son.

Prescott Bush, a financier and businessman, eventually entered
politics and was elected to the Senate, serving from 1952 to
1963. He died in 1972.

It was Mrs. Bush's father who bought the land in Kennebunkport
that became the family compound and gathering place for both joy-
ful and sad occasions. Mrs. Bush was married there, as  was one
of the president's children. On the president's summer trips
there during the last four years, Mrs. Bush could sometimes be
seen on the wide lawns that looked out to the sea.

She was rarely in the public eye, and the nation's knowledge of
her came usually from tales the president would tell sheepishly
of her efforts to keep him, as a child and as president, from be-
ing too self-important. She criticized him once when he appeared
to be reading while President Reagan was making a speech, and
even when he explained he had been simply following Reagan's
text, she suggested that that showed a lack of manners.

He quoted her as saying he talked about himself too much, and
many associates of the president over the years have said Mrs.
Bush's disdain for self-importance caused her son great difficul-
ty in talking about himself.  Besides the president, she is sur-
vived by three other sons, Prescott Bush Jr., Jonathon Bush and
William "Bucky" Bush, daughter Nancy Ellis and more than two
dozen grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

02:27 11-20C9999-----

Copyright 1992, The Washington Post.  This story is from the
Washington Post's Capitol Edition On-Line and is not to be ar-
chived or redistributed.

For more information, send-email to American Cybercasting Cor-
poration (usa@AmeriCast.COM)