PEMBROKE PARK, Fla. – Family, friends and colleagues said goodbye to former Florida Governor and U.S. Sen. Bob Graham Friday.
South Florida news legend and former Local 10 Senior Political Reporter Michael Putney came out of retirement for the day to share some of his memories about the political legend:
Florida is saying goodbye to Bob Graham. There’ll be some tears shed and words of praise said in Tallahassee, and he deserves them all.
I met him when he first ran for governor and covered him for the next 40 years.
I knew him well, admired him immensely.
Bob Graham was the finest elected leader of our lifetime in Florida — honest, smart, decent, fair-minded and totally dedicated to serving the people of Florida, all the people.
Bob – we got to be friends – was born a rich kid in Miami Lakes, but spent his life and career working for everyday working people.
He did that with his “work days,” which started out as a campaign gimmick, but became a core part of his identity.
Every month or so, he’d spend a day – the entire day – doing jobs his constituents did: construction worker, auto mechanic, gardener, once he even was the pooper scooper at a horse show.
Those work days taught Graham what Floridians do to put food on the table and a roof over their heads.
He was there to help them.
He also had a quirky sense of humor.
He’d give you a chorus of “Cheeseburger in Paradise” and loved to sing it with his good friend, Jimmy Buffet.
No matter how high he rose, his feet were always on the ground.
His great passions as governor were restoring and preserving the Everglades, and improving public schools.
In the U.S. Senate, he chaired the intelligence committee and voted against the war in Iraq – pretty gutsy at the time – and later he investigated the terrorists who trained in Florida to fly the planes on September 11, 2001,
In all these things, Graham had a great partner and advisor, his wife, Adele, who survives him.
So, goodbye Bob Graham.
We’ll miss your decency, your steadiness, your integrity, your bipartisanship.
We need a lot more of that.
Bob Graham brought people together, and oh how he loved Florida! This is a day to remember him and love him back.