Buffalo Bill Burial - William Frederick "Buffalo Bill" Cody died on January 10, 1917, from natural causes, surrounded by family and friends at his sister's house, in Denver, Colorado. A grand state funeral followed on January 15, where the body lay in state in the rotunda of the State Capitol from about nine a.m. until noon. Cody's body then traveled through the streets of Denver to the Denver Elks Lodge No. 17 for the funeral. After the funeral, his remains went to George Olinger's Denver mortuary, where they remained in a vault for nearly five months while the gravesite was prepared.<br />On June 3, 1917, Buffalo Bill's remains were carried to the summit of Lookout Mountain in Golden. Mourners and the curious arrived on special trains that ran from Denver to Golden. A steady stream of cars clogged the roadways into Golden and special buses shuttled people up the recently completed Lariat Trail-perhaps Colorado's first traffic jam. The Lookout Mountain Park Funicular saw its busiest day ever. <br />At three in the afternoon Buffalo Bill was laid to rest in a full Masonic burial service, under the auspices of Golden City Lodge Number 1. The front page of the Colorado Transcript reported:<br />"With solemn and impressive Masonic burial rights, the Golden lodge of Masons, in the presence of 15,000 people conferred the last honors over the remains of Buffalo Bill. <br />The casket of solid metal was lowered into a grave blasted from the eternal granite. The site was one that the old scout himself would have selected, on the lofty eminence commanding the mountains and plains he loved so well.<br />A poem dedicated to the sleeping scout was read by Jay J. Bryan of Golden. A farewell service followed, which was conducted by the entire body of Masons."