The Cowboy Diplomacy of Dory Funk Jr.

Dory Funk Jr.—pro wrestling champion, trainer, and international icon—died earlier this month at 85. Although less famous here, perhaps, than some of his colleagues, Funk’s life provided an object lesson in the power of sport and spectacle to win hearts around the world. And for those who knew him personally, as I did, the news of his passing landed with the sudden finality of one of his famous spinning toe holds. He was the last of a breed that understood how to make another man look like a million bucks without diminishing himself—never flashy, never loud, only precise, relentless, and kind in a way that already feels foreign.