Ronald Reagan aide shares tales of ex-president

Posted on February 6, 2015

Ronald Reagan's boyhood home in Dixon is seen. (Photo courtesy Facebook/ RonaldReaganBoyhoodHome)

By Jim Anderson

CHICAGO – Today is the birthday of Ronald Reagan, the only president native to Illinois.
 
He was born on this date in 1911 in Tampico – and while this is not as big a day as Lincoln’s birthday or Presidents Day, it’s an important day for Peggy Grande, who was Reagan’s executive assistant after he left the White House, from 1989-99.

“I feel like I need to be a good steward of the experiences that I was given, and I do realize that it was a unique perspective, sitting right there, watching this man, day in and day out," Grande said. "At times he didn’t even know I was watching, taking everything in, and I really feel like it is an obligation and a duty of mine, although an incredible honor and privilege, to tell those stories, to talk about who he was privately, behind the scenes.”

Grande has speaking engagements on the subject today and Saturday in Carol Stream, O’Fallon and at Reagan’s boyhood home in Dixon, at which she will talk about what Reagan was like as a person.

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