Reagan entombed at his hilltop library

LOS ANGELES — Ronald Reagan's body was sealed inside a tomb Saturday at his hilltop presidential library following a week of mourning and remembrance by world leaders and regular Americans.

Workers closed the underground crypt shortly before 3 a.m. while a handful of Secret Service agents, library personnel and mortuary representatives watched, said Duke Blackwood, executive director of the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley.

Reagan's widow, Nancy, and his three surviving children had left hours earlier following a Friday night sunset ceremony.

In his second tribute in two days, President Bush on Saturday called Reagan a "modest son of America."

"Ronald Reagan always told us that for America, our best was yet to come," Bush said in his weekly radio address. "We know that is true for him, too. His work is done."

A headstone of Georgian gray granite was to be set up at the memorial site above the crypt, where an inscription from Reagan himself is set into a curved wall adorned with shrubbery and ivy.

"I know in my heart that man is good. That what is right will always eventually triumph. And there's purpose and worth to each and every life," the inscription reads.

Reagan first used the words while opening the library in 1991.

The solid mahogany casket was sealed within a bronze-lined vault, 7 feet underground inside the crypt, which also includes space for Nancy Reagan.

The vault and casket weigh a total of about 4,000 pounds, and workers needed heavy machinery to move them into place, Blackwood said.

On Saturday, workers covered the crypt with earth and a concrete pathway.

The memorial site will open to visitors at 10 a.m. Monday along with the rest of the 100-acre presidential library and museum, and Blackwood said big crowds are expected.

Also Saturday, hundreds of people gathered at Eureka College to remember Reagan, the tiny Illinois school's most prominent alumnus.

The 1932 Eureka College graduate often credited the tiny school with starting him off to good things. He served on its board of trustees for many years, and used the college as the backdrop for a 1982 speech in which he announced a plan that became the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty.