The Special Relationship : Thatcher Visits Reagan to Help Ex-President Raise Funds for His Library

With British and American flags flying overhead, former President Ronald Reagan led former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and her entourage Monday on a personal tour of his unfinished presidential library.

Reagan, Thatcher, her husband, Sir Denis, and other family members had midmorning tea behind closed doors at the massive mission-style building in eastern Ventura County before venturing outside to pose for cameras from British and American media in front of a hunk of the Berlin Wall mounted on the library grounds.

Reagan aides tried to discourage interviews at the event that was billed as only a “photo opportunity.” But questions shouted from reporters about the Gulf War proved to be too great a temptation for the two former world leaders.

“What I can say about Saddam Hussein is (that) he is a threat to civilization,” Reagan told about 50 reporters, photographers and TV camera crew members. Asked for a message to U.S. troops overseas, he said: “God bless them for what they are doing.”

Thatcher expressed “great confidence in our military commanders” to remove Iraqi troops from Kuwait. “Obviously, we long for the day when the work is complete,” she said. “Any tyrant must know that this is the response with which he would meet.”

Thatcher came to California--her first visit to the United States since leaving office--to attend Reagan’s 80th birthday dinner Wednesday at the Beverly Hilton hotel. Thatcher--who holds a science degree from Oxford University--also spent about an hour and a half Monday touring the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, where she saw a display area featuring a full-scale model of the Voyager spacecraft as well as photographs it sent from space.

Thatcher will address about 900 guests at the birthday dinner, which Reagan boosters hope will raise as much as $2 million for his library. The library is scheduled to open in nine months and will hold Reagan’s presidential papers and other White House memorabilia.

At the dinner, guests will see videotaped greetings from President Bush and other world leaders. Gov. Pete Wilson and Vice President Dan Quayle are scheduled to attend.

Bill Garber, Reagan’s spokesman, said the Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation is more than half way to its 10-year goal to raise $75 million to pay for the library and launch the Ronald Reagan Center for Public Affairs, a conservative think tank that will occupy a small section of the building.

Once completed, the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library, which will include a museum, will be bigger and more expensive than any of its 10 predecessors. It will include 153,000 square feet of space and cost $60 million, according to Charles H. Jelloian, the foundation’s director of operations.

Reagan supporters had hoped to complete the library in time for the former President’s birthday Wednesday. It is now scheduled to open in November.

All initial costs will be covered by private donors. Taxpayers will pay for most of the library’s upkeep, estimated at $1.5 million to $3 million yearly.

Federal tax records obtained by The Times show that the foundation had raised $52.2 million from 1985 through 1989, with another $20 million in uncollected pledges. Garber said the IRS figures are misleading. Although he said he has no up-to-date figures, Garber put cash donations collected through 1989 at $36.7 million.

Located off Madera Road between Simi Valley and Thousand Oaks, the Reagan Library will house an estimated 54 million pages of White House documents and 30,000 gifts Reagan received during his eight years as President.

The 22,000-square-foot public museum will trace Reagan’s life from boyhood to the presidency. One gallery will be devoted to Nancy Reagan as First Lady.

In one section of the museum, construction crews are crafting a replica of the Oval Office. To make it more authentic, the Reagan foundation has asked the White House for the carpet and desk that Bush had pulled out of the Oval Office when he assumed the presidency.

“We are going to consider loaning the carpet,” said Rex Scouten, White House curator. Bush is still using the desk in a residential wing of the White House.

Reagan aides say the arid beauty of the Simi Hills, with dramatic outcroppings of red rock, has worked out as an ideal setting for the Reagan Library.

Not only does the terrain recall the dozens of movie Westerns shot on location in the hills; politically, this is Reagan country, too. The area voted overwhelmingly for Reagan for President and is known for its blend of conservative politics and orderly suburban lifestyle.

Building from scratch in an undeveloped section of Ventura County has driven up the cost of the project by requiring construction of a 400,000-gallon water tank on the library grounds and a milelong access road that twists up the hillside.