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The casket of erstwhile Sen. Bob Dole, R-Kan., is carried down the East steps of Capitol Hill successful Washington, Friday, Dec. 10, 2021, aft lying successful state. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)

TOPEKA, Kan. – Bob Dole made a last travel backmost to the prairie authorities that shaped him for memorials successful his occidental Kansas hometown and astatine the Statehouse to grant the subject work that near him severely wounded and the distinguished governmental vocation that followed his recovery.

Honors Saturday for the precocious erstwhile U.S. Senate bulk person and statesmanlike campaigner volition statesman with a nationalist viewing of his casket and a memorial work astatine a Roman Catholic religion successful Russell, the tiny municipality immoderate 240 miles (386 kilometers) westbound of Kansas City wherever helium grew up during the Great Depression. Dole died Sunday astatine the property of 98 aft serving astir 36 years successful Congress and moving arsenic the GOP nominee for president successful 1996.

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Another memorial was to travel Saturday day successful the authorities superior of Topeka, wherever Dole concisely served successful the Kansas House successful the 1950s. The database of speakers was bipartisan, including Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly and Kansas' 2 Republican U.S. senators, Roger Marshall and Jerry Moran.

Dole was honored Friday during a work astatine Washington National Cathedral arsenic a legislator who could signifier bare-knuckle partisan authorities without losing civility and arsenic a patriot whose grit overcame superior wounds from combat successful World War II successful Italy successful 1945. He was known for a caustic wit that helium sometimes turned connected himself.

“God, what courageousness Bob Dole had,” President Joe Biden said during Friday's work successful Washington National Cathedral. The Democratic president served with Dole successful the Senate for much than 20 years and had a 50-year relationship with him.

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Another tribute followed astatine the World War II Memorial successful Washington — a monument to Dole's procreation that helium worked to get built. Among the speakers was histrion Tom Hanks.

Dole volition beryllium buried successful Arlington National Cemetery, but his casket was flown to Salina, Kansas, past transported 70 miles (113 kilometers) westbound to his boyhood hometown, which present has astir 4,400 residents.

Oil accumulation allowed Russell to roar erstwhile Dole was increasing up, adjacent during the Great Depression, with the archetypal section good drilled successful 1923, the twelvemonth helium was born. In accepting his 1996 statesmanlike nomination, Dole recalled a municipality surrounded by wheat and lipid wells wherever “no 1 grows up without an intimate cognition of distance.”

“And the archetypal happening you larn connected the prairie is the comparative size of a antheral compared to the laic of the land,” helium said.

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Also contributing were Will Weissert and Colleen Long successful Washington, and Charlie Riedel successful Salina, Kan.

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Follow John Hanna connected Twitter: https://twitter.com/apjdhanna

Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This worldly whitethorn not beryllium published, broadcast, rewritten oregon redistributed without permission.