Sandra O’Connor was warm, gracious and unassuming

Sandra Day O’Connor, trim and festively clad in cowboy denim and boots, walked quietly away from the dust-stirring clamor of about 700 guests and seated herself on a low, shaded wall while a Western band warmed up.

Last Sept. 20 marked the 100th anniversary of the Lazy B ranch where four generations of the Day family have grown up, never straying too far.

SANDRA, THE OLDEST of Harry Day’s children, earlier took her place beside her mother Ada Mae, brother Alan and sister Ann (Mrs. Scott Alexander) and long-time foreman Webb Cole atop a wagon that was circled by friends, relatives and guests.
Each got up from their folding chair and spoke briefly into a microphone, sharing greetings, a special anecdote or two and some slightly choking sentiments about the landmark gathering.

Sandra, with a permanent and warm smile fixed on her face, had watched her father with clear-eyed adoration as the 83-year-old patriarch stiffly fidgeted with the microphone and then launched past some brief public shyness into a reel of momentum-gathering recollections of ranch life that were lost among the mostly younger crowd, who applauded and laughed eagerly.

SANDRA’S SHORT, WELCOMING remarks were polished, gracious and almost unnoticeably forgotten – the way it was supposed to be. After all, the day was designed for nostalgia and Harry Day.

She sat quietly on the wall in front of her girlhood home and patiently studied the throng in front of her while dust sifted upward in the heat of the breezeless