Mayor Bob O'Connor's funeral will be held on Thursday at 11 a.m. at St. Paul Cathedral in Oakland, following four days of visitation that start at noon today at the City-County Building.

Mr. O'Connor, 61, died Friday night of a rare form of brain cancer after serving in office only eight months. He had been hospitalized for two months.

The O'Connor family yesterday worked on details of the mayor's final farewell, even as they, along with the mayor's friends and admirers around the city, sought to recover from the shock of his sudden decline and death.

"It'll be especially hard on Judy. They've been together since they were high school sweethearts," said Dennis O'Connor, of Baldwin Borough, a cousin of the late mayor who was like a brother to him as they were growing up in Greenfield.

It's also tough on Corey O'Connor, 22, the youngest of the mayor's three children, Dennis O'Connor said. "He's not just losing his father, but losing his best friend," he said.

Daughter Heidy Garth is dealing not just with her own grief, but also with the challenge of explaining the loss to her three young children, on whom the mayor doted. "They just want to know where their grandpap's at," he said.

The late mayor's elder son, the Rev. Terrence O'Connor, is "very level-headed and he takes this very well because of his Catholic religious beliefs," Dennis O'Connor said.

The family remained optimistic all the way through the mayor's illness, even following the onset last Sunday of seizures and an infection, which required emergency surgery to replace a shunt that carried excess fluid from Mr. O'Connor's brain.

"Judy was the strong one here. She was the one who kept the faith that Bob was going to make it through this," said Dennis O'Connor. "We all believed it until the infection."

"We really did. Up until the final days, we still had visions of Mayor O'Connor riding in a car in the Labor Day parade," said General Services Director Yarone Zober, who served as deputy mayor for nearly a month while the mayor was disabled.

As the mayor's status worsened and death seemed imminent, his administration buried itself in work, Mr. Zober said. The usual Thursday staff meeting "started out talking about Mayor O'Connor briefly, but I tried to keep it on focus and discuss what we had to get done," he said.

Key staff were on 24-hour call, he said, waiting to jump into action in case the mayor died and a new mayor needed to take over, as happened with the Friday night swearing in of Luke Ravenstahl.

"There's definitely an emotional drain," Mr. Zober said, "because you're sort of sitting on the edge of your seat, waiting for a call you hope you're never going to get, and hoping there's such a thing as miracles."

Such a transition was a possibility Mr. O'Connor foresaw in a lighthearted moment in February, when he saw Mr. Zober and Mr. Ravenstahl, then City Council president, palling around.

At St. Rosalia Church in Greenfield, the mayor's home parish, yesterday afternoon, people arrived in droves for the 4 o'clock Mass. They came from up the street, down the street, across the street and parking lots. They wore the clothes of a leisure Saturday but with sad, stoic faces -- pairs of elderly women, men alone, women alone, families, children hanging onto plastic toys.

The Rev. Joe Reschick reminded those in attendance that "it's only with the heart that we can speak rightly," and attributed the virtues of a right and true heart to the late mayor, who was given so little time in his dream job.

"The people of Pittsburgh today feel disbelief, sadness, grief and great loss," said Father Reschick. "His family is experiencing the grief much more deeply than we do, and so we keep them in our prayers."

"I remember the day after his election," said Father Reschick. "He stood at the bottom of Greenfield Avenue during rush hour, holding a sign that read, 'Thank you, Pittsburgh.' As he departed us, with that familiar smile, the twinkle in his eye, with a little wave, he said one last time, 'Thank you, Pittsburgh.' "

Outside the church, someone had left a bouquet of feathery purple-and-white fluted flowers with a note taped to them. It read, "Bobby O, we will miss you at our family 'Steeler' tailgates. Your spirit, strength and love will guide our city and Mayor Luke. Love, Barb."

Long before he began battling central nervous system lymphoma and all the complications that came with it this summer, Mr. O'Connor occasionally alluded to his own funeral in lighthearted conversation.

"He did joke about it at the inauguration, that he wanted us to play his funeral," said Pittsburgh Police Lt. Mike Scott, pipe major for the Greater Pittsburgh Police Emerald Society Pipes and Drums.

The 22-man bagpipe troupe expects to be involved in several parts of the Mr. O'Connor's final, journey, which will take him from the City-County Building to a funeral home in Shadyside and finally to the funeral Mass.

Members of the Emergency Medical Service honor guard expect to flank the casket throughout the public viewing, said Jeff Vesci, president of the Fraternal Association of Professional Paramedics. In Mr. O'Connor, the paramedics lost a friend and a respected negotiating partner, he said.

The City-County Building will be open for visitation starting at noon today and continuing straight through to 10 p.m. tomorrow. Mr. O'Connor's body will then be moved to John A. Freyvogel Sons Inc. in Shadyside.

Tomorrow's Labor Day parade, which starts at 10 a.m., will be dedicated to Mr. O'Connor's memory, in honor of his fairness and respect for working people, Allegheny Central Labor Council President Jack Shea announced yesterday.

This is cache, read story here