FROM
THE ARCHIVES.......1986
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down the grassy aisles. In the
midst of the ner-
vous throng was the flag-draped knotty pine
casket pulled by two brown mules, and behind the
casket an open flower-festooned truck carrying Dr.
Measely's spotlight, which occasionally came to
life without warning, swinging this way and that,
sending hot 1250° beams willy nilly among the
mourners, and causing them to scatter frantically.
A large model of a black hole was pulled by a
U.S.P.S. delivery jeep to symbolize Sir Horton's
greatest discovery of all, the black hole in the
Newark Bulk Mail Center. His son and heir, Bill
Measely, walked quietly along, accompanied by a
small group of pig-nosed macaques, and some-
times stopped to wipe his face with a red check
handkerchief.
A gravelly voice boomed
suddenly over the
hills and headstones. Horton Measely was a man
whom we knew, and who knew us, and who knew
that we knew him. Horton Measely was a man,
and he knew it. The ceremony went on that way,
brief but poignant, filled with glowing accolades
from colleagues and detractors alike.
Eventually people
grew bored and began to
drift off. The sun broke through the clouds as the
final vigilant slipped silently away. Light breezes
ruffled the petals of the flowers on the great man's
grave. A dog picked up a wreath in its mouth and
carried it off. It began to rain. |
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Rain
squalls darkened the far horizon and rapidly
moving clouds periodically obscured the scene yester-
day as the Sir Horton Measely cortege moved solemnly
through the streets of Washington on its way to the
Arlington National Cemetary. Though the scene was
sometimes hidden, nothing could conceal the greatness
of the man, gone now because his hydrogen laser
spotlight swung around without warning and burned
him severely.
People stopped and
looked up from their shopping
as the growing crowd went by, past the Washington
Monument, past the Lincoln Memorial, past the Tomb
of the Unknown Primate, across the Arlington Memorial
Bridge, and into the cool, clean air of Arlington Cemet-
ary. A 707 flying high up seemed to dip its wings in
salute, but that was probably only one person's heated
imagination.
Millions of closed
eyes looked on as the great
horde of dozens of simple people inched hesitantly |
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