
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, March 28, 1990                   TAG: 9003280137
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A/3   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                LENGTH: Medium

IKE FONDLY RECALLED AS A `GOOD SOLDIER'

American and British leaders lauded Dwight D. Eisenhower on Tuesday to mark the centennial year of his birth, but Eisenhower's son said his father would like to be remembered simply as "the good soldier."

"He was the vaunted warrior who hated war," John S.D. Eisenhower told a joint meeting of Congress held in honor of the World War II leader and two-term Republican president.

Members of Eisenhower's family, including several occasionally squirming great-grandchildren, joined gray-haired veterans of the Eisenhower administration in seats on the House floor.

Many of the guests and members of Congress - Democrats and Republicans alike - wore red, white and blue "I like Ike" buttons, replicas of paraphernalia of Eisenhower's 1952 and 1956 campaigns.

Martial and patriotic music was performed by the Army Band, which was joined by the Military Academy glee club from West Point.

"No man did more to rid our planet of the Nazi scourge," said Senate Republican Leader Bob Dole, from Eisenhower's home state of Kansas.

"No one gave more in the Cold War against human enslavement," Dole said. "And no one deserves more gratitude from a world waking up to its own potential."

Winston S. Churchill, grandson and namesake of the prime minister who worked closely with Gen. Eisenhower during World War II, said the changes in Eastern Europe would gratify both the military man and the British leader.

The younger Eisenhower, a military historian who bears a strong resemblance to his father, said the United States was lucky to have "good soldier Ike in control of our nuclear arsenal" in the turbulent 1950s.

Later, President Bush called Dwight Eisenhower "a healer, not a hater."

"Every president admires other presidents," Bush said. "And so today I say it proudly and very proudly: I always liked Ike."

Eisenhower was born Oct. 14, 1890, in a house that now is part of a state park in Denison, Texas. He was one of seven sons of David and Ida Eisenhower. One son died in infancy.

When Dwight was less than a year old, the family moved to Abilene, Kan., where the future president grew up.

Eisenhower, who died March 28, 1969, is buried in Abilene.

The Dwight David Eisenhower Centennial Commission, established by Congress to observe the 100th anniversary of Eisenhower's birth, has planned observances throughout the year, including a hometown celebration in Abilene on Eisenhower's birthday.

by CNB