Thurmond Funeral To Be Tuesday In Columbia

GREENVILLE, S.C. -- Funeral services for former Senator Strom Thurmond will be Tuesday in Columbia.

Thurmond, the oldest and longest-serving senator in United States history died Thursday in his hometown of Edgefield at the age of 100.

"Surrounded by family, my father was resting comfortably, without pain, and in total peace," Strom Thurmond Jr., the senator's son and U.S. attorney for South Carolina, said in a statement.

The former senator died at 9:45 p.m.

Thurmond's body will lie in state at the Statehouse Sunday, Monday and Tuesday.

Monday's visitation will be from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. and Thurmond will continue to lie in state Tuesday morning from 9 until 11.

The body will be on the second floor of the Statehouse.

Thurmond's body will be taken by a caisson Tuesday from the Statehouse to First Baptist Church in Columbia for the funeral at 1 p.m.

After the funeral, a procession will take Thurmond to the Willowbrook Cemetery in Edgefield to be buried in a family plot.

State Sen. John Courson says all the memorials will be open to the public.

Thurmond had retired in January after 48 years in Senate and returned to his childhood home, where he lived in a suite of rooms at Edgefield County Hospital.

Thurmond had become weaker in recent days, sources told News 4.

Friends said that Thurmond reportedly communicated on Thursday that he was looking forward to meeting his first grandchild, who was born earlier this month.

Former Sen. Strom Thurmond has become a grandfather for the first time at age 100.

Thurmond was 68 when he and his wife, Nancy Moore, had their first child, Nancy.

The couple had three other children before separating in 1991: Strom Thumond Jr., Juliana and Paul. Nancy Thumond died in 1993 after being struck by a car on a Columbia street.

Thurmond's first grandchild, Martin Taylor Whitmer III, was born June 19 in Washington to his daugther Juliana Thurmond Whitmer and Martin Whitmer.

The retiring senator's daughter had surprised him at his 100th birthday party in December with the announcement that she was pregnant.

A Half-Century Of Service

James Strom Thurmond was born in Edgefield, on Dec. 5, 1902, more than a year before the Wright brothers flew.

He is the only U.S. senator ever elected as a write-in candidate. That election was held in 1954.

But Thurmond, a former governor of South Carolina, took to politics much earlier than that.

Bob Dole was 5 years old when Thurmond was first elected to public office. And in 1948, Thurmond ran for the presidency as a pro-segregation Dixiecrat: he won six Southern states.

Thurmond became a Republican in 1966 and supported Barry Goldwater, saying Democrats were leading the nation into a socialistic dictatorship.

Staunchly against racial segregation early in his career, Thurmond, like most of his fellow white Southerners, appeared to have a change of heart in his later years.

In 1977, Thurmond escorted his 6-year-old daughter Nancy to her first day in the first grade of a Columbia elementary school that was 50 percent black.

"He named the first black person to a senior administrative position; he's the first southerner to do that in Congress," Thurmond historian Dr. Chuck Dunn told News 4.

That is part of the Strom Thurmond irony. The senator who would reach out to blacks is the same one who stood for more than 24 hours on the senate floor filibustering against a civil rights bill.

Thurmond was a teacher, a judge, a soldier who landed on D-Day in World War II and a political icon who in many ways typified South Carolina.

"If you had to pick one person whom embodies the whole of South Carolina political culture, Strom Thurmond is the best embodiment of the culture," Dunn said.

Thurmond won his first election as Edgefield County schools superintendent in 1928 and was South Carolina governor from 1947 to 1951.

A statue of the Thurmond sits on the Statehouse lawn in Columbia.

South Carolina House Speaker David Wilkins said Thurmond's name is synonymous with the word "service."

The Senate suspended debate on a Medicaid bill on Thursday night to observe a moment of silence in Thurmond's honor.

South Carolina Sen. Fritz Hollings said that even though he and Thurmond were in different parties, there was no doubt Thurmond did everything he could for South Carolina.

Previous Stories:

• January 7, 2003: Graham, Dole Replace Senate Legends
• December 6, 2002: Washington, South Carolina Salute Thurmond's 100th Birthday