Paralyzed Cowboy Buried Standing Up

A cowboy who was confined to a wheelchair for the last six years of his life received his dying wish: He was buried standing up, with his boots on.

Jimmy Dale Struble, 49, died last week of lung complications. He was paralyzed from the neck down in 1986, during what friends said was a fight with another cowboy over who was the better roper. “He hated lying flat on his butt for six years, and he didn’t want to be buried that way,” said Glenn Younger, one of several dozen mourners who paid their last respects Tuesday.

In a funeral procession tailored to Struble’s last requests, mourners followed his saddle-draped coffin as it was taken to the graveyard in a pickup truck. Struble’s friends lowered his casket, feet first, into the ground with their lariats.