For a little over 30 minutes Monday afternoon at the Missouri Capitol, the names of 60 former state senators were read one-by-one, in a roll call one last time.
As current senators answered "here" to each name, then carried a white rose from the back of the Senate chamber to a long table temporarily placed across the front - members of the former senator's family stood in the upper gallery and watched as the current senator lit a candle in memory of the former lawmaker, who had died since the last time the Senate held such a memorial, more than 30 years ago.
"It was most impressive," Sue Strong of Jefferson City said. "It was very moving."
Her husband, James R. Strong, served in the Missouri Senate from 1983-91, after serving 10 years in the House. He died in 1998. Current Sen. Mike Kehoe, R-Jefferson City, represented him.
Sen. Shalonn "Kiki" Curls, D-Kansas City, said she experienced a special moment in the ceremony, when she answered for her uncle and mentor, Sen. Phil Curls, who represented much of the same senate district she serves.
Senate President Pro Tem Tom Dempsey, R-St. Charles, told his colleagues and the families and friends of those being honored: "To walk upon the floor of the Missouri Senate is to walk in the steps of great men and women who've served here before us.
"Their memories do, indeed, live on in the customs, the courtesies, the rules and the lore of this august body."
He said today's senators "do, indeed, stand on the shoulders of giants who have served here before us."
Senate leaders nearly six months ago asked reporter and historian Bob Priddy to discuss the chamber's history and the roles some of those 60 honored Monday had played in the Senate.
"I realized that I knew, saw or had talked to almost two-thirds of these people," Priddy explained. "Most of them served in the pre-term-limits era, when longevity brought a certain level of wisdom to the General Assembly and to this chamber - when corporate political memory was an important guide to those who served here, an guide to the policies and the behaviors to those who served."
Priddy reminded today's senators that those being honored Monday "were no greater humans than you are now, or those who served before them. They served with varying degrees of distinction."
And some things haven't changed much in the Senate's history, Priddy said.
"The ability to debate at length is still with us," he said. "The challenges of working with the other chamber across the hall - across the Rotunda - or working with the governor were similar to those today," including lawmaker frustrations with various governors' vastly different levels of "involvement in the process."
Priddy noted Sen. Ed. Dirck, D-St. Louis County, was credited with fighting until Missouri had a seat belt law.
State Sen. Ike Skelton, D-Lexington, "did much of the work the last time the criminal code was rewritten" in the mid-1970s, but was elected to Congress before the project was finished, and Sen. Harry Wiggins, D-Kansas City, "was the one who carried it to final passage."
And some filibusters involved story-telling.
"When those of us in this chamber heard the words, "Would you like to know, Senator?'" Priddy recalled, "we knew we were about to embark on a meandering journey with the greatest story-teller I have ever heard in this room, and in this building" - Sen. Danny Staples, D-Eminence.
Most importantly, Priddy said, those previous senators being honored Monday, "like your generation, were people who were citizens, who felt called to service for the betterment of the people of the state of Missouri."
Dempsey noted lawmakers work together so often they become "family" to each other.
And he thanked the family members who support political careers but "don't make headlines, stand in the limelight, receive plaques, awards or accolades but, nonetheless, have made their own sacrifices so that a loved one could serve in the Missouri Senate."
Sue Strong noted Mid-Missouri lawmakers have fewer problems than others on that score.
"I was lucky that I had Jim home almost every night - except when there were those (late) committee hearings," she recalled. "For me, there were many more pluses than minuses.
"And many more pleasant memories."