Nov. 1, 2002 -- Twin tragedies in the past week have made their mark on the tight Senate race between sitting Missouri Sen. Jean Carnahan and former Rep. Jim Talent, although both candidates are keeping a rigorous campaign schedule with the Nov. 5 election just days away.

Talent took two days away from the campaign trail after his father, 91-year-old Milton Talent, died Sunday. The Republican nominee cancelled campaign stops Sunday and Monday, but kept a scheduled appearance with former President Bush Tuesday morning in Springfield before heading back to St. Louis for his father's visitation.

Meanwhile, the death of Minnesota Sen. Paul Wellstone in a plane crash Friday inevitably focused national attention on Carnahan, whose husband, then-Missouri Gov. Mel Carnahan, died in a similar crash late in his 2000 Senate campaign.

Unlike the situation in Minnesota this year -- where former Vice President Walter Mondale has been allowed to replace Wellstone in the race -- Missouri law mandated Mel Carnahan's name remain on the ballot. Mel Carnahan won the election, and Missouri's governor appointed Jean Carnahan to fill two years of her husband's term.

For her part, Carnahan attended the public memorial service for Wellstone Tuesday evening, speaking fondly about the late senator's personality and principles. After the ceremony, she told The New York Times she and others recognized the similarities between Wellstone's crash and the accident that killed her husband, her son who had been piloting the aircraft and a campaign adviser.

"It does cause a lot of images from two years ago to come back, and a lot of thoughts that you thought you had gone past," she said. "But you realize how fragile life is, and how much people who serve do sacrifice, as Paul did. But I think people are going to judge this election on my record."

Some analysts, however, say the Wellstone crash could reignite feelings of sympathy and give Carnahan a boost in the polls.

"Something like this could have a symbolic impact because it dredges up all these memories," Rick Hardy, a political science professor at the University of Missouri at Columbia and a former GOP candidate for Congress, told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

But Talent, like Carnahan, said he thinks the campaign's focus will remain on the issues and the candidates' backgrounds.

"We're talking about who has the experience to make a difference in the Senate, and we're going to continue to talk about it," Talent told the Post-Dispatch on Saturday. Nonetheless, the Missouri race remains among the Senate's tightest, although polls show Talent with a slight, but growing edge.

A Research 2000 poll released Oct. 18 shows Talent ahead 47 percent to Carnahan's 46, but still within the 4 percent margin of error.

However, a Zogby poll released five days earlier shows Talent in the lead 47 percent to Carnahan's 41, outside the 3.6 percent error margin. A bevy of stars -- political and otherwise -- have joined the fight in Missouri to pitch in for the two candidates.

Talent has enlisted both the former and current President Bush, former New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani and Missouri Sen. Kit Bond, a fellow Republican, in recent weeks.

Carnahan has had Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, former presidential candidate and New Jersey Sen. Bill Bradley, "West Wing" star Bradley Whitford and pop singer Sheryl Crow weigh in on her behalf.

Carnahan has turned the election into a family affair, dispatching daughter Robin and sons Tom and Russ to speak in more than 50 cities and towns in the campaign's final week, the Post-Dispatch reports.

Talent, whose staff continued campaign appearances during his two days in mourning, has continued his appearances across the state as well, telling the Post-Dispatch Wednesday he's held more than 70 events in Greene County in the southwest, home to the city of Springfield.

The candidates themselves continue to tout a variety of issues. Carnahan has highlighted her support for Social Security and a prescription drug plan, while Talent has backed President Bush's homeland security and tax cut plans.

Republican campaign ads continue to take Carnahan to task for her relative inexperience in the Senate, and, most recently, have said she "accepts thousands of dollars" from "liberal special interests and rejects the president's plan" on homeland security, the National Journal reports.

Democrats, meanwhile, assert electing Talent would be bad for education, saying he voted "twice against funds for teacher training," and "even co-sponsored Newt Gingrich's bill to abolish the Department of Education," the Journal says.

Meanwhile, Missouri Secretary of State Matt Blunt, a Republican, has sought to quell speculation that a Talent victory Nov. 5 could immediately shift leadership of the Senate to the Republicans should control of the body continue to hang by a single-seat margin.

Blunt said that while Carnahan's appointment only lasts until the state certifies this election's winner, it's more likely that decision would come around Nov. 26 -- some three weeks after Election Day.