Ordinary Folks Say Farewell to Famous Friend : Nixon: Ex-President’s relatives and classmates eulogize him as diplomatic and a team player. His brother recalls the early years with ‘a great man.’

The dignitaries will honor him at formal services today in Yorba Linda.

But Tuesday was a time for ordinary people to eulogize Richard Nixon, as friends and relatives gathered in Whittier to remember the former President.

The local high school band played as former classmates, members of the Nixon and Milhous families and townspeople filed into the Whittier College gymnasium--decorated with a simple arrangement of mums next to a photograph of the school’s most famous alumnus.

The crowd of 2,000 heard Nixon remembered for being the college’s student body president before becoming the nation’s 37th President. They heard how he helped edit the school newspaper long before his own name became a fixture in the news. They laughed as he was described as a failure at football who never forgot the importance of being a team player.

“For over 60 years Richard Nixon was a friend, an interested and an interesting friend,” said Dolores Ball, a classmate of Nixon’s at Whittier. It was a relationship that led to “many lively discussions around the dinner table” as Nixon became an elected official.

World events and domestic issues “were much more real when a personal friend was involved. He made history come alive,” Ball said.

Former football teammate Clint Harris said that what Nixon lacked as a player he more than made up for as a friend. “He was a live wire right to the last days,” Harris said. “I thank God he went peacefully when the time had to come. I’ll think of him always.”

Cousin Theodore F. Marshburn talked of Nixon’s Christmas gifts and the firecrackers that he always managed to rustle up each 4th of July.

“We’ve often said he inherited his diplomatic skills from his mother and his determination from his father,” said Marshburn, an ophthalmologist. “We feel his skills have led to a more peaceful world.”

Edward Nixon, a businessman who at 63 bears a startling resemblance to the late President--right down to the ski-nose and jowly cheeks--recalled how an automobile trip through Arizona with his older brother had prompted him to become a geologist.

His brother occasionally let 9-year-old Edward sit between his legs and steer the car on straightaways, Edward Nixon said. And he agreed to pull over and stop to see a huge hole left by a giant meteor.

The younger Nixon said his mother used to laugh about how 9-year-old Richard sat on the kitchen floor reading newspaper accounts of the Teapot Dome political scandal. Looking up, he said: “Mother, when I grow up I want to become an honest lawyer,” according to Edward Nixon.

As an older brother, Nixon would sometimes mediate playground disputes.

“If you started breaking the rules, Dick would grab the football and say, ‘Nobody gets the ball until you play by the rules,’ ” Edward Nixon said.

“He was a brother to me, and a brother to a lot of people all over the world. He was a great man, a great brother. And a great friend to the world.”

Tears rolled down the younger Nixon’s cheeks as the ceremony drew to a close and the college choir sang the hymn “Immortal Love, Forever Full.”

Michelle Muller lingered as the crowd slowly filtered out of the gym. No one was watching as she placed a tiny bouquet of flowers next to Richard Nixon’s portrait.

“His aunt and uncle lived across the street from me when I grew up,” Muller said afterward. “His death is a personal thing here. I thought Richard Nixon was a good man.”