Reagans recreate home with antiques

ILLIOPOLIS, Ill. -- Politics makes strange bedfellows, which may help explain why it took a lifelong Democrat to show Ronald Reagan that you really can go home again.\nJesse Rogers, a 40-year Democratic precinct committeeman from Illiopolis, was the go-to guy when Reagan admirers sought to refurnish a Dixon home the way it was when the president lived there from 1920 to 1923. Rogers age 77, and now retired, ran Rogers Antiques with his wife, Lee, and their seven children, boasts about his reputation in antiques.\n"We were the largest-volume antiques dealer in central Illinois," Rogers said. "And we never sold a reproduction."\nThe story of re-creating the interior of the Reagan home at 816 S. Hennepin St. began in 1980. Dixon families clubbed together and raised $31,500 to buy the home in honor of the local boy made good.\nThe hunt for period-appropriate furnishings was done to a list approved by The Gipper himself. Illinois Gov. James Thompson, a noted antiques fanatic, had often visited Rogers Antiques and liked what he saw. He told the expert in charge of the Reagan shopping expedition in 1982 to pay the store a visit.\n"You think of all the Republican antiques dealers there must have been, but they came here," Rogers said.\nSome six months had been set aside to find the furnishings that Reagan recalled. \n"But we had three floors of stuff stacked to the ceiling," Rogers said. "It took the guy doing the buying about 30 minutes to get almost everything on his list."\nThe shopping spree included several tables, chairs, dressers, a china cabinet, couch, a gas stove on legs and a vast wooden ice box and even a Singer sewing machine. The bill, including refinishing, came to $2,375. Rogers has a memento copy of the check, but he has yet to see his treasures in their new home.\n"But I will one day," he said. "I'm determined I'm going to go before I cash in."\nSon Jesse L. Rogers, visited the late president's boyhood home recently for the first time with his wife, Sharon, and brought dad back an album of pictures as a surprise Father's Day gift. Rogers' son, 53, said his father has plenty to be proud of. \n"My dad was saying the other day that he didn't have much to show for his life," Rogers' said. "But he raised seven kids successfully, and he's part of the neat story of that furniture; we're proud of him."\nPerhaps the best testament came from Dutch himself, who visited the house on Feb. 6, 1984, and celebrated his 73rd birthday there. The White House chef cooked a meal on the stove Rogers supplied, and the president ate it sitting in a chair at the dining table -- all courtesy of Rogers.\n"The president said the house looked just like he remembered it," Marla Tremble said, coordinator for the Ronald Reagan Home. She said the only thing that disconcerted the 6-foot-1-inch Great Communicator was the scale of the place he had moved into when he was 9.\n"What did you do to shrink it?" Reagan asked.