Nancy Reagan begins final journey to husband's side

(AP) — Nancy Reagan began her final journey to her husband's side Wednesday as a police motorcade carried her casket down an empty freeway lined with saluting firefighters and mourners holding hands over their hearts in tribute to the former first lady.

The roadside reverence reflected her late husband's touch with the common man and followed some of the route his own funeral procession took in 2004, eventually winding its way up to the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library, where volunteers in blue jackets stood behind a guardrail festooned with small American flags.

The day began with a private ceremony for family and close friends at a funeral home in Santa Monica, followed by a public viewing at the library.

People came from near and far to pay tribute to the widow of the 40th president, who was respected for her grace, strength and unfailing loyalty to her husband during this two terms in office and his final struggles with Alzheimer's disease.

Construction workers in hard hats, riders on horseback, parents holding children and other observers lined the roadside to watch and to snap photos with their cellphones.

When the hearse arrived at the library, a military honor guard carried the casket between two identical towering portraits of the diminutive Mrs. Reagan wearing a long, red dress and then past a gurgling courtyard fountain.