Secret Service Agent Who Saved Reagan Dies at 85

Parr, the Secret Service agent credited with saving President Ronald Reagan’s life amid a death endeavor in 1981, died Friday at a hospice close to his home in Washington.

Parr reportedly died of congestive heart failure.

In a statement, former First Lady Nancy Reagan called Mr Parr “one of my true heroes”.

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After telling the driver to go back to the White House, Parr ran his hands over Reagan’s body, but found no injury. He retired in 1985 and became an ordained minister.

Parr’s quick thinking on that dramatic day in 1981 “not only saved the life of president Reagan, but Jerry’s actions preserved the institution of the office of the presidency”, Clancy added.

“Without Jerry looking out for Ronnie on March 30, 1981, I would have certainly lost my best friend and roommate to an assassin’s bullet”, she said in a statement widely cited in U.S. media on Saturday. His fascination with the service began as a child, he wrote, when his father took him to see the 1939 film ‘Code of the Secret Service, ‘ which starred a young Mr. Reagan as Agent Brass Bancroft. “When he was about probably six or seven feet from the vehicle, I heard these shots”, Mr Parr said in a 2013 interview promoting his book “I sort of knew what they were, and I’d been waiting for them all of my career, in a way”.

Protecting VIPs from every conceivable threat, Parr said, “is like eating a chicken gizzard. It is no big surprise that he and my spouse got along so well”.

Mr. Parr saw his job as more than isolating the president in a cocoon and was willing to take extra steps to allow him to visit places and talk to people. White House Press Secretary Jim Brady, who suffered a grievous head wound, died in 2014 from complications from his injury. He was humble but strong, reserved but confident, and blessed with a great sense of humour.

‘It is no wonder that he and my husband got along so well’.

He is survived by his wife, three daughters and four grandchildren.