Indiana man who died in plane crash wrote own comedic obit: ‘I am completely dead now'
An Indiana man wrote a darkly funny obituary for himself, which was published after he died in a crash involving his homemade plane.
Gary Wolflet, 72, fatally crashed his self-made single-engine Express 2000 FT plane in Ohio on May 5, and though he was perhaps not prepared for the accident, he was ready for the inevitable, according to a report from WXIN.
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3 Gary Wolflet wrote his own obituary that was released after he was killed in a plane crash in Ohio on May 5, 2025.
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'Hello. I am Gary. I am completely dead now. I am surprised that it took this long to happen,' the deceased man wrote.
'I had several close calls throughout my lifetime. I guess that I was just lucky that something didn't get me long before now.'
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Wolfelt then chronicled a series of cartoonish close calls that occurred over the course of his life — including taking a baseball to the head as a Little Leaguer, being kicked in the stomach by his sister's horse Cricket, getting hit by a car, narrowly escaping a falling chimney, and taking a spill down a flight of stairs while holding a concrete-lined safe that landed on his chest.
After that last fall, Wolfelt said he was forced to go to a doctor who discovered he had prostate cancer — 'I had just dodged another bullet.'
'I cannot tell you here what sort of event actually killed me as I wrote this obituary before I was completely dead. Someone else will have to fill in the details later on I guess,' he added, not knowing he'd end up leaving this life doing one of his favorite things.
3 First responders gather near the scene of the plane crash in Ashland County, Ohio on May 5, 2025.
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In a heartwarming turn in the comedic obit, the amateur aviator also laid out his 'most important accomplishments.'
'I stayed lovingly married to the same woman for a long time. I cut about 100 cords of firewood. I fixed a lot of problems for a lot of people over the last fifty years. I paid all of my bills with my own earnings. I only took welfare (Social Security) after I retired,' he stated simply.
Wolfelt didn't want children, so instead he and his wife Esther had dogs — which he admitted to liking more than 'most people that I came into contact with throughout my lifetime.'
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Still, he made sure to show his gratitude to those of the humankind whom he did like.
'I would like to thank those of you who loved me while I was here on Earth. It really meant a lot to me. And I appreciate your letting me love you right back,' he wrote.
In a P.S., Wolfelt cleared the record on his voting history, writing, 'I also want you to know that I didn't intentionally vote for any socialists during my lifetime.'
'So I am not the least bit responsible for the mess that America is in at the moment.'
The prolific posthumous penman said he wouldn't have a funeral, adding, 'In lieu of flowers, please keep the money and take yourself out for a nice dinner or do something nice for someone else.'
'Good bye and Peace. I am hanging up now,' Wolflet concluded.
3 Officials investigate the field where the single-engine plane crashed, killing Wolflet.
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Wolflet is survived by his wife Esther, three brothers and sisters, and several nieces and nephews, according to an addendum written by Esther.
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'Hopefully if there is a life after death, I will end up with Esther and all of our dogs in a sunny field of tall grass with music playing all around me. It was music that made me the happiest most of my life,' he wrote.
Even in his death, Wolfelt left an impact.
Dozens of strangers signed the guestbook section of his obituary, heaping on praise over his autobiographical obit.
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Los Angeles Times
18-07-2025
- Los Angeles Times
Where artists tippled, an ode to Cole's French dip: L.A. arts and culture this weekend
Artists are formed by the spaces they spend time in — and in the case of countless Los Angeles artists, writers and musicians, that place was the city's oldest restaurant and bar, Cole's French Dip, which is slated to close on Aug. 2. Founded in 1908 by Harry Cole in downtown's historic Pacific Electric building, then the city's primary railway transit hub, the legendary public house is credited with inventing the French dip sandwich after its chef dipped bread in au jus to soften it for a patron who had trouble chewing. (Note: Philippe the Original in Chinatown takes issue with this story, claiming full credit for the juicy culinary delight.) The possibility of an apocryphal legend aside, Cole's went on to become one of the very best bars in the area, attracting a solidly blue-collar crowd over the years, including the notoriously ribald, drunken poet Charles Bukowski. The restroom even sported a placard that read, 'Charles Bukowski pissed here,' an unflinchingly literal claim to fame frequently mentioned in self-guided tours of literary L.A. (Barney's Beanery in West Hollywood has a less off-color plaque at its bar in reference to Jim Morrison, who allegedly relieved himself on the spot without heading for the urinals.) I like to think of Bukowski with a beer and a shot of whiskey in front of him, scribbling away on a napkin at the bar in Cole's. I've done the same over the years, having discovered the bar in 1999 when I first moved to Los Angeles. Downtown was not on the up-and-up in those days, and Cole's had fallen on hard times but was still beloved. My rock band played a few shows in its back room, and I fell in love with what was at the time a true dive bar — a place where the occasional unhoused patron spent his Social Security check alongside a smattering of unknown, paint-spattered artists who stopped by from nearby studios. I remember meeting a musician there one night who invited me and a friend to his 6th Street loft and showed me literally thousands of records stacked like a maze throughout the space, so high that you couldn't see over them, so many that I wondered if he had space to sleep. Cole's was that kind of bar — a refuge for artists and misfits, a place that didn't care what your story was as long as you had a good one. The last time I went to Cole's before downtown bar magnate Cedd Moses (artist Ed Moses' son) bought it and restored it to its early 20th century glory, a rat ran over my foot as I sat at a torn, tufted banquette. I love a good dive (my husband proposed to me at the now-shuttered Brown Jug in San Francisco's Tenderloin District), but that was a bridge too far, even for me. 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Preceded by a 1988 short, 'Measures of Distance,' in which filmmaker Mona Hatoum combines letters from her mother in war-torn Beirut with layered images and voice to question stereotypes of Arab womanhood. Both films are part of the UCLA Film and Television Archive's series '(Dis)placement: Fluctuations of Home.'7:30 p.m. Saturday. Billy Wilder Theater, UCLA Hammer Museum, 10899 Wilshire Blvd., Westwood. 'Berta, Berta'Andi Chapman directs the West Coast premiere of Angelica Chéri's love story about a Black man seeking redemption in 1920s Mississippi. DeJuan Christopher and Kacie Rogers ('Furlough's Paradise' at the Geffen) 19-Aug. 25; 8 p.m. Fridays, Saturdays and Mondays; 4 p.m. Sundays. The Echo Theater Company. Atwater Village Theatre, 3269 Casitas Ave. GiselleAmerican Ballet Theatre dances this romantic tale set in the Rhineland forests where betrayal, revenge and forgiveness play out. 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New York Post
14-07-2025
- New York Post
Maine may not be New York — but at least it has patriotism
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Buzz Feed
02-07-2025
- Buzz Feed
15 Everyday Things From Past Decades That You'd Never Do Today
It's always fascinating to consider what ubiquitous aspects of modern culture weren't always so standard. So recently, we asked the BuzzFeed Community, "What's something that was so 'normal' back in the day but could NEVER happen now?" The responses were insightful and a major nostalgia trip. Here are just 15 things that really stood out: "Letting your kids outside to do and go wherever they please as long as they're home by dinner. The things we did, the trouble we got into, and the places we went without our parents just 25 years ago, like drinking out of the water hose and eating whatever food our friends' parents had. Like, they really trusted that we could just survive on our own, and I mean we did. But parents these days would have a complete meltdown if their kid leaves their eyesight. That isn't to say I don't understand the fear, as the sheer amount of missing kids or major injuries that occurred definitely warrants the fear. But still, those days could never be relived now." —Anonymous, 36; Ohio "Riding in the bed of an open pickup truck with a half-dozen other kids. Sometimes, we would even sit on the sides." "You can't slam a phone to end a phone call in a furious state of dissatisfaction. Now you press a screen button on your phone. 😂" —Anonymous, old man; Oregon coast "'Smoking' and 'non-smoking' areas in fast-food restaurants — with nothing to separate the two sides." "Growing up in Florida, we could fish in the river and ocean from the beach without a fishing license. Freshwater, we had to have a license. Now to fish, you have to have a license except under 16 and over 65." —Anonymous, 68; Florida "🛫 Walking up to the airport gate without a ticket. Back in the day, you could literally: show up with your friend or family, go through security without a boarding pass, wait with them at the gate, even wave them off as they boarded, and be there when they got off the plane." "Buying my parents their cigarettes. We just went to the store and told them they were for them, and we paid and left. Skipping gleefully home because we got penny candy with the change!! 🤣" —Anonymous, 54; Texas "Making a collect call." "Walking into a room filled with the sound of typewriters." —Anonymous, 56; Oxford, England "We were encouraged by the police to engrave our Social Security number on valuables in case they were stolen." "Seat belts and car seats were not mandatory until the 1980s. Before then, kids could sit wherever and pack in the car (although my parents and most of my friends' parents were sticklers for using seat belts and car seats)." —ktomato "Going days without seeing your parents, especially in the summer, with the only communication being notes written on the back of envelopes on things that needed to be done. When the weather was good, we were outside on our bikes or on foot walking through the woods, out fishing, walking the train track looking for pennies, at a friend's house jumping on a trampoline, or anywhere but home. We came home when it was dark, way after our parents had gotten off work. And they would usually leave the house to go to a friend's to play cards, leaving the oldest child in charge. There would be a note on the table of what to eat for supper, sometimes a phone call if the teenage sister wasn't talking to friends all night, and a repeat of this the next day. The summer between my 4th and 5th grade years, I think I saw my mother a total of three times that entire summer." "Smoking on an airplane." —Anonymous, 35; Washington, DC "I am French, and while I wasn't born yet, I know that wine used to be served to children in kindergarten (and older) until 1956 when it was finally banned for the youngest kids. However, students aged 14 and up were still allowed to drink (including in school cafeterias) until 1981!" Finally, "Questionable first aid tactics. Even just simple stuff like it used to be standard to dump peroxide into open wounds, which we now know slows healing. But also, much more casual attitudes about things like concussions." —casualpizza23 Have another example of something that used to be so very common but would be considered odd to do today? Let us know in the comments or through the anonymous form below!
