Marblehead —   Three local groups made their way to the Obama inauguration on January 20, and their experiences were as different as their mode of transportation — they came by train, plane and car.

Margaret Somer, a self-described political wonk, drove with a friend from Biddeford, Maine and both joyfully endured the bitter cold as they stood among the masses for hours, their bodies stinging under double layers of clothing.

Unable to make their way through the mass of humanity to reach the Washington Mall for which they had tickets, they eventually pushed through the doors of a restaurant to watch Barack Obama take the oath of office from a crowded restaurant where they stood in line for two hours waiting to be seated.

“Nobody cared. People were packed in. Everybody watched TV and cheered,” said Somer, the manager of the Northeast Massachusetts Small Business Development Center housed at Salem State College’s Enterprise Center. “Nothing could dampen people’s spirit. There was warmth and instant friendship with people we met from all over the country. I met people from Texas, Arizona, California, the Midwest and I saw a bus with a ‘Canada for Obama’ banner,” said Somer, still exhilarated from her trip days after returning home to Swampscott.

For the Ehrlich family of Marblehead who went by Amtrak Acela, it was a once-in-a-lifetime moment. State Rep. Lori Ehrlich and husband Bruce, brought their daughters, Casey, 16 and Jamie, 13 and spent several days. As a state representative, Lori was invited to a Democratic Party brunch in Hillary Clinton’s office. The Ehrlichs saw former President Bill Clinton there but finally despaired of meeting Hillary when they left to go downstairs in the elevator. As the doors opened, the former First Lady breezed by with the Ehrlichs doing an abrupt about face, following right behind her, back to the party. They met, she hugged the girls who told her she inspires them, and Bruce snapped their picture.

Before inauguration day, the family went to the U.S. Holocaust Museum. For Jamie whose bat mitzvah is in March, it was a seminal event.

“Going into that small railroad car [that transported Jews to the death and concentration camps], it sends chills through you,” said Bruce. So struck by what she saw, Jamie resolved to devote her bat mitzvah project to something related to the Holocaust.

When she returned home, she contacted the Holocaust Center in Peabody to ask what she could do for them. Without hesitation they gave her the job of listening to DVDs and transcribing the stories of survivors. It is what they needed done for their new Legacy Partners project. (See story elsewhere in this issue.)

With tickets they were able to get from Congressman John Tierney, the Ehrlichs attended the inauguration in the Purple Section, in back of the first seating section and in front of the reflecting pool where they could see and hear Obama as he became the 44th president.

“Everybody was in a great mood,” Bruce said. The subways were “incredibly efficient,” but the crowd control outside was horrendous. “We had friends who had tickets and never made it in.”

For Casey Ehrlich it is impossible to say what the highlight was.

“Everything tied in with everything else, even the pandas in the National Zoo,” Casey said. “We were concerned about the future of the pandas. They are very endangered.”

The inauguration was “empowering,” she said. “Obama said everything he had to say without sugarcoating it. He was honest and I don’t think people are used to it.”

Veteran political consultant, Michael Goldman of Marblehead, gathered his family, flew to Washington days earlier and hired a car to take them around. They secured ticketed seats some 20 rows behind the podium.

Goldman spoke only in superlatives of the enormity of the crowd (1.8 million) the exuberance of the business proprietors all along the parade route and adjoining streets, and a feeling of inclusiveness with all Americans that he found to be missing at the 1992 inauguration of Bill Clinton that Goldman attended.

Goldman, his wife Susan, twin daughters Lauren and Michelle and her boyfriend, Jeff Hodess, arose at 5 a.m., dressed and were driven as close as they could get before the streets were blocked off. They quit the warmth of the car and exited into the 20-degree frigid air to huddle with others as the crowd continued to bulge and grow like the waves of a tsunami behind them until looking back, Goldman was struck dumb.

“The line became enormous,” Goldman said. “The crowds were massive behind us. At the Clinton inauguration there were one million people. The difference between one million and two million is incomprehensible.” Goldman marveled that there “wasn’t a single arrest” during the inauguration, nor did he hear a profane word uttered while in the company of throngs of freezing people.

“There was no beauty shop, no grocery market, no liquor store that didn’t have an Obama sign. There was nowhere you could drive, no side streets, no houses that were not decorated, even when we were nowhere near the parade route,” he said.

When President George and Laura Bush ascended over the crowd in their helicopter, people waved goodbye with an unspoken but palpable feeling of relief, said Goldman.

“I waved too, thinking ‘Don’t let the door hit you on the way out,’” Goldman quipped, reflecting the low popularity rating of the former president. There may have been a few audible boos, but in general people were respectful, even to former Vice President Dick Cheney, who may be the most unpopular vice president in recent history according to a New York Times poll.

There was one exception where the crowd didn’t hide its feelings and that was their reaction toward Connecticut Senator Joe Lieberman. He was roundly booed when he entered the seating area and his visage appeared on the Jumbotron.

“There was a substantial, long enough boo. I didn’t hear that same thing for either Cheney or Bush. That was interesting,” Goldman said.

Lieberman, now an Inde­pendent Democrat, gave a speech at the Republican National Convention supporting candidate John McCain, which is something many Democrats apparently are not inclined to forgive.

As for his feelings about Obama, Goldman sums it up saying, “He’s got ‘it.’ Paul Newman had ‘it’ when he was in ‘The Hustler.’ Even in his 60s, Newman had ‘it.’ This guy, Obama, has the ‘it’ factor.”