Former Vice President Dick Cheney remembered at Bush Center in Dallas
At the George W. Bush Presidential Center is a wooden table with flowers and a few framed photos of former Vice President Dick Cheney.
From Wisconsin to Illinois, people from around the country signed the late VP's memorial book on Tuesday, including Bush Center Museum volunteer Natalie Stollenwerck.
"He was a wonderful vice president, and the world is a sadder place because he's gone," said Stollenwerck. "Well, people respected him, and he leaves a great legacy, and he was a great man."
The Cheney family announced the 46th vice president died on Monday from complications of pneumonia and cardiovascular disease. During his decades in public service, Cheney served as white house chief of staff, Wyoming congressman, secretary of defense, and most notably, as George W. Bush's vice president from 2001 to 2009, helping lead the nation through the "war on terror."
"He was a rock of sorts from the time that he was a relatively young man, and almost everybody, from President Ford forward through both president Bushes, took that rock-like presence to be a sort of commanding knowledge of American politics and the Republican party, and what it stood for, and what it could be used to accomplish," said Cal Jillson, a political science professor at SMU professor.
Cheney survived multiple heart attacks and had deep ties in Texas, living in Highland Park while serving as CEO of Halliburton in Dallas. He made headlines in 2006 after accidentally shooting a friend during a quail hunt in South Texas.
"He was comfortable here; he understood and was understood by leading republicans in Texas, of the sort of Bill Clements generation, coming forward, so he was a man of Wyoming, but he was very comfortable in Texas," Jillson said.
Jillson added that while Cheney was considered more of an outsider of the Republican party in his later years, he was a patriot who helped shape the nation.
"He's a man that people will remember for a long time," said Jillson. "They'll remember the good, the bad will fade a little bit, but he was an American."
