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Obama visits grandmother, perhaps for last time

(Agencies)
Updated: 2008-10-24 15:38

HONOLULU - Barack Obama left the campaign trail Thursday to visit his ailing grandmother in Hawaii, perhaps for the last time.

This undated photo released by Obama for America shows Barack Obama with his grandparents, Stanley Armour Dunham and Madelyn Lee Payne Dunham in New York City, during a visit with Obama, who was a student at Columbia University. [Agencies]

Although it's a crucial period in the presidential race, the Democratic candidate said he is making time for the visit because he doesn't want to risk his grandmother dying before he has a chance to say goodbye - something that happened when his mother succumbed to cancer.

"I want to make sure that I don't make the same mistake twice," he said in an interview on CBS' "The Early Show" Thursday.

The campaign has not discussed Madelyn Dunham's health in detail, but the 85-year-old woman is said to be gravely ill after falling and breaking her hip. Dunham, whose birthday is Sunday, was recently released from the hospital.

At a rally Thursday in Indianapolis, a minister asked the crowd to pray for Dunham as a "source of comfort, healing and courage." And in an interview with ABC's "Good Morning America," Obama said his grandmother "has been inundated with phone calls and e-mails and flowers from total strangers."

"And so maybe she is getting a sense of, of long-deserved recognition at toward the end of her life," Obama said.

Obama was born in Hawaii. His Kansas-born mother and Kenyan father met as college students there, but Dunham and her husband, Stanley, raised Obama for extended periods when his mother lived overseas.

In his memoir "Dreams from My Father," Obama described his grandfather as something of a dreamer. It was his grandmother who was practical enough to support the family by working her way up in the ranks at a local bank.

He has often mentioned "Toot" - his version of the Hawaiian word "tutu," or grandparent  as an example of a strong woman succeeding through intelligence and determination. Many of his speeches describe her working on a bomber assembly line during World War II.

"My grandmother's the last one left," he said. "She has really been the rock of the family, the foundation of the family."

Obama planned to meet with his grandmother Thursday night and Friday before returning to active campaigning in Nevada on Saturday.