As an Army lieutenant on the front lines of the Cold War, Ray Finch knew things were changing when Ronald Reagan became president in 1981.

Maybe it was Reagan’s “Evil Empire” speeches about the Soviet Union, accompanied by the deployment of nuclear missiles to Europe. Maybe it was the increase in defense spending, which included a pay raise for soldiers. Or maybe it was both.

“It was an exciting time, because we knew things were changing,” said Finch, now assistant to the director of Kansas University’s Center for Russian and East European Studies. He was stationed in West Germany during the 1980s. “There was this air of, ‘Hey, this guy is going to take on these guys.'”

Eventually, Reagan’s hard line against the Soviets got credit for bringing about the end of the Cold War. But Finch didn’t participate in campus commemorations for Reagan’s funeral Friday. Few others did, either.

“As I got older, I saw he was blowing smoke,” Finch said. “But at the time, if it wasn’t a sea change, it was a change in (Army) morale.”

Coverage of Reagan’s funeral was projected on a giant television screen at Woodruff Auditorium in Kansas Union, but only two members of the public showed up to watch.

“Because it’s historic,” Dennis Budd, a KU employee, said as he watched. “Because it’s observing the death of someone who made a big difference.”

The bells of the World War II Memorial Campanile sounded from 10:30 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. Across campus at the Dole Institute of Politics, hundreds of people had filled 35 pages of a condolence book that will be sent to the Reagan family in California.

“President Ronald Reagan will be remembered forever,” said a typical inscription in the book. “He was one of our nation’s greatest leaders.”

A KU ROTC honor guard stood by as visitors signed the book.

“There’s been quite a few people,” said Mike Roy, an Air Force ROTC cadet from Smithville, Mo., after he finished his shift. “People have been writing quite lengthily.

“It’s definitely an honor” to stand guard, Roy said. “President Reagan served the country honorably.”

“It’s been a nice, steady pace of people coming in,” said Alison Carter, a Dole Institute volunteer.

Friday afternoon, a line of several visitors was continuous as people waited to sign. Carter said many had gone out of their way to drive to the institute and sign the sympathy note to the family of the country’s 40th president.

“I think people just have this urge to participate,” Carter said.

Some of the visitors were almost teary.

“I love President Reagan and think he was one of the best presidents we ever had,” said Mickey Hermrech, of Lawrence.

Hermrech said she had watched media coverage of Reagan’s death continuously for the last several days.

Another Lawrence resident ventured to the institute to pay thanks to the president for helping end the oppression that had plagued family members in communist Croatia for years.

“I kind of get choked up just thinking about it,” said Barbara F. Wood.

Wood’s grandmother is from Croatia, and she traveled there in 1987 to visit her 95-year old great uncle in the village of Dugaresa.

At the time, the town’s one officer refused to give them a ticket out.

“Scary stuff,” she said.

At KU, Finch’s department trained many senior military officers during the Cold War. That training emphasis for senior soldiers shifted soon after the Berlin Wall fell, Finch said, but the center remained a vital place during the 1990s as scholars got their first good look behind the Iron Curtain.

“It was real exciting,” Finch said, “because it was like a veil had been lifted from a secret society.”

Staff writer Lindsay Hanson contributed to this story.

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