The "Reagan magic" was not obvious in many of his roles.

The movie "The Killers" with Angie Dickinson was filmed in 1964. The very same year, Reagan began to sparkle politically, showing audiences the passionate skills that his movies often lacked.

"You and I have a rendezvous with destiny. We'll preserve for our children this, the last best hope of men on earth. Or we'll sentence them to take the last step into a thousand years of darkness," Reagan said in a speech for Barry Goldwater's presidential campaign.

"It wasn't long after that speech before literally dozens of Californians began to kick their money in and beg him to run, and he did," Goldwater said.

By the time Reagan became a candidate, he had successfully targeted the coalition that eventually swept him into the White House.

"There is a new majority out there. It is made up of millions of disenchanted Democrats and independents who are waiting and looking for a banner around which to arise. And I claim we have that banner," he said.

The "Great Communicator" could touch the common voter with disarming logic and optimism.

"To believe that together, with God's help, we can and will resolve the problems which now confront us. And after all, why shouldn't we believe that? We are Americans. God bless you and thank you," Reagan said in a campaign speech.

"You might not have agreed with everything he said, but you felt good about how he did it," Lee Iacocca said of Reagan's ability to reach the people.

In a crisis, as when the Challenger astronauts anxiously boarded their spacecraft, only to die moments later, as the country helplessly watched in horror, he was the nation's grandfather: "We will never forget them, nor the last time we saw them, this morning as they prepared for their journey and waved goodbye. And 'slipped the surly bonds of earth to touch the face of God.'"

And he could be the world's protector.

"Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate," Reagan said in prophetic challenge to the Iron Curtain. "Tear down this wall."

But Reagan boiled down his ability to reach people not to the style of his delivery, but to the content of his messages.

"In all that time, I won a nickname, the 'Great Communicator.' But I never thought it was my style or the words I used that made a difference," he said.

"It was the content. I wasn't a great communicator, but I communicated great things. And they didn't spring full bloom from my brow. They came from the heart of a great nation."

He drove the Washington press corps crazy, yet still disarmed them: "I used to work for a fellow named Jack Warner. Any public appearance that he had to make, he would start with a speech and then say, 'Go to hell with that.' "

As Reagan left office, he taped a poignant farewell that he hoped would cement his legacy:

"They called it the 'Reagan Revolution,' and I'll accept that," he said. "But for me, it always seemed more like the 'great re-discovery.' A re-discovery of our values and our common sense."