MISERICORDIA UNIVERSITY -- As United States Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia is mourned this weekend, some people in our area are reflecting on their personal experience with the Supreme Court justice.
We talked with two people who interacted with Scalia in both his personal and professional worlds.
As Justice Antonin Scalia was escorted to the Supreme Court building for one last time, Misericordia University student Nicholas Remsky from Pittston was on campus thinking about when he met the Supreme Court icon only three months ago.
"You think to yourself, 'I met this man just a few months ago and now he's no longer with us,'" said Remsky.
Remsky was part of a group studying in Washington, D.C. last fall that shared a meet and greet and conversation with Scalia.
Remsky will never forget it.
"He was very kind, very open-hearted, very funny, which I found very surprising. I knew he had this odd sense of humor, but you know, it was like talking to a member of his family almost. He was very open and animated."
We've heard a lot about Scalia's humor since he died last weekend and Remesky says he saw some of that when his class also got to see Scalia and the court in action.
"I was curious to see how he would be acting on the bench as he was with us in the room and he was exactly the same way."
Scalia was on the Supreme Court for 30 years. In that time, former Pennsylvania Attorney General Ernie Preate argued two cases before him.
"I got to see him in action," Preate recalled. "He questioned me, he was very thorough, very clear, very crisp, very respectful and then I saw him in social settings.
Preate saw a contradiction in Scalia's often sharp and biting decisions with his in person warmth.
"He was very engaging, very warm, very much of an approachable person. He was not standoffish, somebody you could never talk to. He loved to talk to people."
And Preate says he'll be hard to replace.
"The man himself was larger than life, larger than life."