# Funerals of the morbidly obese **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [December 13, 2005, 6:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funerals-of-the-morbidly-obese/335393 "2005-12-13T06:57:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Moirai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/96bed5/32.png) [@Moirai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Moirai)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2005, 1:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funerals-of-the-morbidly-obese/335393/21 "2005-12-14T01:24:51Z")
I really like how it looks when the pallbearers carry the casket by grasping the arm of the man across from them with the casket balanced on their shoulders, rather than by grasping the handles on the side. Is that primarily a British thing? I recall seeing it done that way in several movies (_Four Weddings and a Funeral_ comes to mind). ---
**Author:** ![alphaboi867](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alphaboi867/32/3898_2.png) [@alphaboi867](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alphaboi867)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2005, 2:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funerals-of-the-morbidly-obese/335393/22 "2005-12-14T02:37:28Z")
> [@Dewey Finn](#): > > I’m surprised by the anecdotes of pallbearers actually carrying the coffin. Somehow, I got the idea that it was a mostly ceremonial thing now, and that the coffin was carried on a cart, with the pallbearers walking adjacent to it. Every time I’ve been a pallbearer we lifted the coffin off a gurney to load in into the hearse and unloaded it from the hearse at the graveyard then carried to the lowering thing at the grave. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2005, 2:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funerals-of-the-morbidly-obese/335393/23 "2005-12-14T02:59:57Z")
> [@Harvey The Heavy](#): > > she had to be sent to an out of town creamatory Did her fat rise to the top? ---
**Author:** ![simian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d2c977/32.png) [@simian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/simian)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2005, 3:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funerals-of-the-morbidly-obese/335393/24 "2005-12-14T03:01:37Z")
> [@Shalmanese](#): > > There are some people who are into big women. In fact, there is even a “feeder” sub-culture where men deliberately encourage their spouses to gain weight and then exhibit them to other feeders. I remember from a doco we watched about weight in high school, apparently in some cultures, the bigger wife was a status symbol. Bigger Wife = More Food = Wealthier… ---
**Author:** ![Harvey\_The\_Heavy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/c5a1d2/32.png) [@Harvey\_The\_Heavy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Harvey_The_Heavy)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2005, 3:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funerals-of-the-morbidly-obese/335393/25 "2005-12-14T03:41:08Z")
> [@Sigene](#): > > Not to sidetrack too much but… > > I saw the show mentioned too. The cremains the wife was given didn’t seem to be very big. I’ve handled cremains of a 200 pound person, and it seemed the boxes were similar in size. Did they not give all of the ashes to the woman, or is it correct that 200lb and 750lb people reduce down to roughly the same mass? Actually, the “ashes” you get back are really little more than ground up bone. Everything else, the tissue, fat and organs goes up the chimney. ---
**Author:** ![jasonh300](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/46a35a/32.png) [@jasonh300](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jasonh300)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2005, 4:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funerals-of-the-morbidly-obese/335393/26 "2005-12-14T04:50:52Z")
> [@postcards](#): > > Found it! > [Walter Hudson 01-02-92](http://fff.fathom.org/pages/taojones/Walter%20Hudson%20RIP.jpg) Looks like that hearse probably needed a new set of leaf springs when that was overwith. I wonder if those Caddy hearses come with a towing package. ---
**Author:** ![Tuckerfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2005, 4:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funerals-of-the-morbidly-obese/335393/27 "2005-12-14T04:57:30Z")
> [@jasonh300](#): > > Looks like that hearse probably needed a new set of leaf springs when that was overwith. I wonder if those Caddy hearses come with a towing package. Actually, I think that they do, since they have to haul a pretty heavy load (even an ordinary person can weigh a lot in certain ostentatious coffins) and travel at slow speeds for extended period of times. That can be as hard on a car as towing a trailer. ---
**Author:** ![voicesinmyhead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/cc9497/32.png) [@voicesinmyhead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/voicesinmyhead)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2005, 5:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funerals-of-the-morbidly-obese/335393/28 "2005-12-14T05:03:02Z")
> [@postcards](#): > > Walter Hudson, of Long Island, dided in December of 1991 (I think). It was repoorted at the time that he weighed over 1,000 pounds, and his funeral was delayed for over a week while a casket was built for him. > > Somewhere in my archives I have a photo of the hearse driving through the cemetery. Did you ever see a hearse hauling a trailer before? I hadn’t, and now I’ll have to rummage through my pictures to find the print. If I do, I’ll post it. > > For the record, the casket on the trailer was about eight or nine feet long by about as wide. Please don’t post the photograph. Allow the guy some little shred of dignity please. :smack: ---
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2005, 1:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funerals-of-the-morbidly-obese/335393/29 "2005-12-14T13:17:26Z")
> [@jasonh300](#): > > Looks like that hearse probably needed a new set of leaf springs when that was overwith. I wonder if those Caddy hearses come with a towing package. Interesting bio on Hudson [-WALTER HUDSON The Life and Death of a Big Man](http://www.dimensionsmagazine.com/dimtext/hudson.html) ---
**Author:** ![ms.deanna](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b3f665/32.png) [@ms.deanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ms.deanna)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2005, 2:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funerals-of-the-morbidly-obese/335393/30 "2005-12-14T14:05:24Z")
> [@spingears](#): > > **WAG** In Texas or is it Tennessee or some other state … > First they knock all the wind out of the deceased. > Second they kick all the s…t out of him. > Third they bury him in a shoe box. 🙂 ``` lol Thanks for the laugh ``` ---
**Author:** ![handsomeharry](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e9c0ed/32.png) [@handsomeharry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/handsomeharry)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2005, 3:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funerals-of-the-morbidly-obese/335393/31 "2005-12-15T15:41:22Z")
> [@Harvey The Heavy](#): > > I work at a high volume mortuary, and we had a 980 pounder about six months ago. That’s not a typo: _980 lbs!_ 36 y/o female. She was a direct cremation, but she had to be sent to an out of town creamatory because ours wasn’t big enough. She was put on a wooden tray and cinched down with straps and still barely fit in. Took six of us to load her into the van. > > BTW, turns out the 980 pounder was a newlywed. I didn’t see the guy but I’m told he weighed 150 pounds tops. My only question: “How?” My oinly question “WhyY” ---
**Author:** ![Carnac\_the\_Magnificent](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ccd318/32.png) [@Carnac\_the\_Magnificent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Carnac_the_Magnificent)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2005, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funerals-of-the-morbidly-obese/335393/32 "2005-12-15T17:33:32Z")
> [@Shagnasty](#): > > My family owns a cemetary. When I was 17, my father told me and my brother that we were going to be pallbearers for this person we had never met. The reason was that the recently deceased female weighed over 400 pounds and the men that were listed as the pallbearers were all much older relatives that other concerned family members were concerned couldn’t support the weight and they didn’t want an embarrassing incident. She was heavy allright although me, my brother, and one of my friends got the job done. We got out of school so it was well worth it. Three huys for a 400-lb. woman in a casket? Shaggy, did you later star as the Tall Man in Phantasm? > **[Phantasm (1979) - IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0079714/)** > > Phantasm: Directed by Don Coscarelli. With A. Michael Baldwin, Bill Thornbury, Reggie Bannister, Kathy Lester. A teenage boy and his friends face off against a mysterious grave robber, known only as the Tall Man, who employs a lethal arsenal of... ---
**Author:** ![beergeek279](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7ea924/32.png) [@beergeek279](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/beergeek279)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2005, 11:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funerals-of-the-morbidly-obese/335393/33 "2005-12-15T23:21:59Z")
> [@Harvey The Heavy](#): > > BTW, turns out the 980 pounder was a newlywed. I didn’t see the guy but I’m told he weighed 150 pounds tops. My only question: “How?” Never underestimate beer goggles!! ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2005, 2:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funerals-of-the-morbidly-obese/335393/34 "2005-12-16T02:59:45Z")
> [@Kalhoun](#): > > We laughed our asses off. You’d be surprised how uncontrollable the laughter is when the unthinkable happens. The Giggle Loop. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funerals-of-the-morbidly-obese/335393.md?page=1)