Bob Graham will lie in state Friday in old Capitol. Here’s how to go and where to watch

The late Bob Graham, former governor and U.S. senator, will lie in state on Friday from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the Florida Historic Capitol Museum. The honor is bestowed on those rendered to have distinguished service to the state so members of the public can pay their respects.

If you are in Tallahassee, you can visit the museum known to locals as the “old Capitol” through its North entrance, which faces the Florida House Office Building and Jefferson Street. Once inside the building, walk up to the second floor. You can also view the ceremony live online at The Florida Channel.

At 11 a.m., Graham’s body in a closed casket will be escorted to the old Capitol’s second floor rotunda by a military honor guard. Around 1 p.m., the military honor guard will transport Graham to a private burial service for family only. Flags will be flown at half-staff until sunset on Friday.

For South Floridians who are unable to view the Friday ceremony, don’t fret.

There will be a public memorial service on Saturday, May 11, in his hometown of Miami Lakes at the Miami Lakes United Church of Christ, the time of which will be released after Graham’s private burial.

The family is asking that in lieu of flowers, well wishers make a donation to the Bob Graham Center for Public Service at the University of Florida. The center’s phone number is 352-273-1080.

After four decades of public service, Graham died at age 87 on April 16. Since the Herald/Times’ obituary ran that night, readers have reached out about their personal interactions with Graham, the kinds of stories that are becoming increasingly rare in politics today.

Nancy Wear, 83, from South Miami, wrote to the Herald/Times that when she was special agent with the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, it was her “honor to serve occasionally... in the FDLE security detail guarding” Graham when he was governor.

“He always knew who each of the people in his security detail was, even those of us in Miami who only worked with him during his visits here,” Wear wrote. “He always treated us with respect and courtesy.”

While people “would chuckle at his ‘little notebooks,’” he used them to “take down issues and questions that came up in meetings with the public,” and then followed up, Wear wrote.

William Delahanty, 90, from Miami, wrote in an email to the Herald/Times that a few years before the pandemic, he visited Graham in his Miami Lakes office to recruit him as guest speaker for Eastern Airlines’ annual reunion luncheon. Graham was “delighted and quickly accepted.”

Delahanty would continue to visit Graham and send him holiday cards, to which “he always wrote back.”

“In our visits he always asked me about my family origins and we discovered Adele [Graham’s wife] taught school at a junior high in Newton Mass that I attended as a youngster while Bob attended Harvard,” Delahanty wrote. “Bob was so interested in ordinary, everyday people he met.”

If you would like your personal stories with Graham to be published, please contact reporter Alexandra Glorioso at aglorioso@miamiherald.com.