First Lady’s Father Buried in Hometown

President Clinton eulogized Hugh Rodham, the father of First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton, during a funeral service Saturday in Scranton, Pa., the hometown Rodham moved from decades ago but never really left.

The Clintons and their 13-year-old daughter, Chelsea, flew into Scranton aboard Air Force One, accompanied by Hillary Clinton’s brothers, Hugh Rodham Jr. and Tom Rodham, and her mother, Dorothy.

Despite a driving rain, hundreds of townspeople lined the narrow streets on the north end of Scranton to watch the presidential motorcade make its way to the 117-year-old Court Street United Methodist Church.

As the church bells pealed, naval pallbearers carried the coffin, draped in a U.S. flag, into the brick-and-stone church where Hillary and her two brothers had been baptized.

The motorcade reached the church 13 minutes late, delaying the start of the private service. About 250 friends and relatives attended and sang the hymns, “Oh God, Our Help in Ages Past,” “Precious Lord, Take My Hand” and “All Hail the Power of Jesus’ Name.” Reporters were kept a block away.

Some of those inside the church said Clinton spoke for about 15 minutes, telling the mourners that his wife and her two brothers were considered by their father to be the most important people in the world.

The President also shared family stories, telling how Rodham as a youngster skated past the church when it was in need of a pianist. Rodham skated into the church, played a song and skated out, Clinton said.

The body of Rodham, 82, was flown to Scranton on Saturday morning after a memorial service in Little Rock, Ark., on Friday. The President had delivered a similar eulogy at that service.

According to Reuters, Clinton had told those mourners that his father-in-law had always remained a Republican who never gave up hope that his son-in-law would abandon the Democratic Party some day and support a cut in the capital gains tax rate.

Rodham died last Wednesday night after a stroke three weeks earlier. After a brief graveside ceremony, he was buried in his family plot at the Washburn Street Cemetery, where his brother and parents are also buried.

Rodham was born in Scranton, the son of a British immigrant who worked at the Scranton Lace Co. He played varsity football for Central High School in Scranton and for Pennsylvania State University, where he earned his degree.

Rodham found a job at the same factory as his father during the Depression, but he soon moved to New York and Chicago as a textile salesman and finally bought his own drapery manufacturing company.

He retired in 1970, and he and his wife moved to Little Rock to be close to his daughter when Clinton was governor of the state.

Although he moved to suburban Chicago many years ago, Rodham and his family returned to Scranton for a two- to three-week vacation every year. The Rodhams owned a two-story cottage a hundred yards off Lake Winola in a resort area 12 miles from Scranton.

Hillary Clinton had kept a vigil by the bedside of her father in the weeks after his stroke. That kept her from her work as chairman of the federal task force on health care. She is expected to return to those duties soon.

The Clinton and Rodham families planned to spend Easter at the presidential retreat in Camp David, Md., before the Clintons return to Washington.