Grand Junction – Growing up in Grand Junction, Wade Oglesby didn’t have a lot of close friends. He was too focused on caring for his ill mother and his baby sister Samantha.
But Saturday, Army Cpl. Wade Oglesby, who calmly faced all troubles in his life with the mantra, “float on,” had 3 miles of admirers lined up along one of Grand Junction’s busiest thoroughfares. They showed their respects as his flag-draped coffin made its hour-long trip down North Avenue in a horse-drawn hearse.
Oglesby, who enlisted after his mother’s death, died April 18 while serving in Iraq. The Humvee he was driving ran over an explosive device outside Baghdad. He was 28.
Oglesby’s story – of having to grow up too soon when he was 5 and his father disappeared; of quitting high school to care for his mother when she was dying; and of becoming a well-respected and well-liked soldier – touched many who never knew the quiet and reserved boy and the man called O.G. by his fellow soldiers.
Kitchen workers and waiters lined up somberly outside the El Tapatio restaurant. Bike mechanics held hands over hearts outside The Bike Shop. Kids in track clothes and baseball players stopped their races and games at Stoker Stadium to silently line a fence while the hearse passed. Golfers at Lincoln Park put down their clubs and climbed out of their carts.
Outside the Veterans Affairs Medical Center, a woman held a sign reading, “God speed soldier.” Another read, “Thank you, Cpl. Oglesby.” Blue-uniformed firefighters and flag-waving veterans saluted in front of Mesa State College, where it was rumored a war protest would take place, but didn’t.
At the end of this somber show of respect, Oglesby was buried alongside his mother, who died four years ago. He was placed in the ground beside her on her birthday.
“He was a great man and a soldier and there is nothing else you can say that does him justice,” said his brother Rick Oglesby.
“He was exceptional,” said Sheila Deco.
Oglesby’s family made its feelings about the Iraq war known during a funeral that ended with the heavy-metal music Oglesby favored.
“Countless bodies are all we see in Iraq – people dying for what?” asked his sister Samantha.
Staff writer Nancy Lofholm can be reached at 970-256-1957 or nlofholm@denverpost.com.
