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Cartoon of Barbara Bush reuniting with daughter who died at 3 brings 'great comfort'

The TODAY correspondent spoke about her grandmother losing her 3-year-old daughter to cancer.
/ Source: TODAY

A poignant cartoon showing Barbara Bush reunited in heaven with the 3-year-old daughter she lost to cancer is providing comfort to her family as they grieve, Jenna Bush Hager said Thursday.

The TODAY correspondent and granddaughter of the former first lady said tributes have poured in since Bush passed away Tuesday, but an editorial cartoon she reposted to Instagram was particularly touching.

Cartoon showing Barbara Bush reunited in heaven with daughter, Robin
This editorial cartoon went viral after Jenna Bush Hager reposted it to her Instagram account.Marshall Ramsey / Clarion Ledger

“We can all have the connection, the thought of being reunited with somebody that we love. And it gives us such great comfort,” she said in a live phone call with her fellow hosts Thursday.

The artist, Marshall Ramsey, the editorial cartoonist for The Clarion-Ledger in Jackson, Mississippi, said he was honored to be noticed by the Bushes.

"Barbara Bush was like our grandmother, too," he wrote in the comments of TODAY's Instragram post.

On Twitter later, Ramsey described the emotional responses he's received to the post.

"The bonus of the cartoon has been hearing from so many parents who have lost a child," he said in the post. "When you sit down at the drawing board, you never know where your art will go."

Ramsey told TODAY he's giving the Bush family the original artwork and copies after a representative for Bush’s husband, former President George H.W. Bush, reached out to him Wednesday night.

Robin Bush was diagnosed with leukemia in 1953, a time when the cancer was considered a death sentence. Her family took her across the country seeking potential treatments, but the girl died on October 11, 1953. It was just two months before her fourth birthday.

Barbara Bush will be buried near her daughter, in a burial plot on the grounds of the George H.W. Bush Library in College Station, Texas.

Jenna said that one of the joys about her work with TODAY is her unique position to share stories about her family

“That just feels like such a wonderful gift, and one of the things I did was talk my Ganny about Robin,” she said.

Jenna interviewed her grandmother about her heartbreaking loss in 2016.

“And now when I hold my beautiful blonde precious 3-year-old I think about her," she said, referring to her daughter, Poppy, who turns 3 in August. Jenna also has a 5-year-old daughter, Mila.

"I think about my Ganny and the relief she must feel.”