Kansas hometown turns out for Bob Dole

RUSSELL, Kan., June 12 (UPI) -- Russell, Kan., welcomed native son Bob Dole home for a weekend visit as the longtime Republican leader nears his 88th birthday.

"It's still home," Dole told The Kansas City (Mo.) Star after decades away. "There's only one home, and that's wherever you grew up."

The former Senate leader and 1996 GOP presidential nominee made a last-minute decision to visit, said his sister, Norma Jean Steele. He visited his other sister, Gloria Nelson, 89, who is hospitalized, and the graves of their parents and brother.

Dole also was the main attraction at Russell's once-a-decade Prairieista festival and rode in a parade atop a fire truck named for his father.

He was accompanied by two other former senators, his wife Elizabeth, who represented North Carolina, and Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, another Russell native.

Dole has spent much of the last few years recovering from a fall at his Washington home and reverses while in Walter Reed Army Medical Center, where he spent almost a year.

Dole entered Walter Reed for knee surgery but developed pneumonia and a slow-to-heal deep blood blister. He got out in November.

"I'm getting stronger every day and walking better every day," Dole said. "It's going to take a while after all that time in the hospital."