Sen. John McCain and Mayor Georgia Lord
Sen. John McCain approached Goodyear Mayor Georgia Lord to be in a commercial with him for his last election campaign. It was used through the entire campaign. (Photo courtesy Georgia Lord)
When it was announced last year that U.S. Sen. John McCain was diagnosed with brain cancer, CNN’s chief medical correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, said the average survival for a malignant glioblastoma patient getting treatment is a little more than a year.
McCain died 13 months later, on August 25, with his wife, Cindy, and their family at his side, according to his U.S. Senate webpage. On August 29, he lay in state at the Arizona State Capitol in Phoenix, followed by a private, formal ceremony inside the Rotunda of the Arizona State Capitol.
The next day, Arizona National Guard personnel carried McCain by motorcade in a public procession to the North Phoenix Baptist Church. One of those who attended a memorial service August 30 at the church was Goodyear Mayor Georgia Lord.
She met McCain in 1973 when McCain attended a party thrown by the best man at her wedding, an Air Force fighter pilot who had been recently released as a prisoner of war in North Vietnam. McCain, a U.S. Naval aviator, was a fellow prisoner of war, having been shot down in 1967 while on his 23rd bombing mission over North Vietnam.
First meeting
“He and my husband engaged in conversations discussing the Vietnam connection,” Lord said, explaining that her husband had been an Air Force fighter pilot who flew with a squadron off the Hanoi and Haiphong area during the Vietnam War. “That is where I had the opportunity to meet and talk with Officer John McCain at the event.”
The next time she met McCain, briefly, was when her daughter, Tiffany, graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy and McCain was the guest speaker.
Lord was elected to fill a two-year unexpired term as mayor of Goodyear in 2011, was re-elected to serve a second term as mayor in 2013 and was elected to serve her final term in 2017. She served on the Goodyear City Council since 2005 before resigning her position as vice mayor to run for mayor.
“When he first visited Goodyear for a presentation to City Council, since I had been elected, I gave him photos from the party that our best man threw back in 1973. It brought back fond memories.”
Together in a commercial
Lord, a Republican who serves in Goodyear’s nonpartisan form of government, was active in McCain’s last political campaign. “Sen. McCain approached me on the last election and asked me to be in a commercial with him. He used that through the entire campaign. So, we became somewhat professionally closer.”
She also assisted him with the Rio Reimagined project that he promoted for progressive commerce along a 58-mile stretch of the Rio Salado River from Granite Reef Dam to State Route 85. “He asked me to sit down with him on this particular project. So, we talked about it, and I decided to support him.
“He was the best, the very best representative for the entire state. He was very kind. Anytime you approached him with a problem he had his staff get right on it,” Lord said. “Our political and professional friendship was built on trust and having a shared military background. It was a very special time. I was honored. My heart aches for the McCain family.”
McCain lay in state on August 31 at the U.S. Capitol, where the senator’s family, colleagues, staff and the public honored his life and service. A ceremony took place after that in the U.S. Capitol Rotunda.
Motorcade past Vietnam memorial
On September 1, McCain was carried with ceremony from the U.S. Capitol by Armed Forces body bearers, secured, and moved by motorcade to the Washington National Cathedral. The motorcade paused at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, where his wife laid a ceremonial wreath honoring all whose lives were lost during the Vietnam War. The public lined the procession route along Constitution Avenue to pay their respects.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has announced he is forming a bipartisan panel to look at an appropriate way to honor McCain, such as by renaming the Russell Senate Office building for McCain, as has been proposed by some congresspeople. Other ideas include renaming a committee room after him or hanging his portrait in a reception room right off the Senate floor.
According to McCain’s website, he was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives from Arizona in 1982 and elected to the U.S. Senate in 1986. He was the Republican Party’s nominee for president in the 2008 election. Although Barack Obama won, McCain won Arizona with 1,230,111 votes, as opposed to Obama’s 1,034,707 votes, and Arizona awarded its 10 electoral votes to McCain.
McCain’s last public comment was a farewell statement read by his former presidential campaign manager and family spokesman, Rick Davis, at a press conference on August 27 at the Arizona State Capitol in Phoenix. “Do not despair of our present difficulties but believe always in the promise and greatness of America, because nothing is inevitable here. Americans never quit. We never surrender. We never hide from history. We make history.”
https://www.westvalleyview.com/news/goodyear-mayor-looks-back-on-mccain-friendship/article_d55ce760-b095-11e8-a54e-d72871a85630.html