{"id":35880,"date":"2026-08-10T05:26:41","date_gmt":"2026-08-10T00:26:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=35880"},"modified":"2026-08-10T05:26:41","modified_gmt":"2026-08-10T00:26:41","slug":"cooter-from-the-dukes-of-hazzard-was-84","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=35880","title":{"rendered":"Cooter From &#8216;The Dukes of Hazzard&#8217; Was 84"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script>\r\n  atOptions = {\r\n    'key' : '644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6',\r\n    'format' : 'iframe',\r\n    'height' : 90,\r\n    'width' : 728,\r\n    'params' : {}\r\n  };\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script src=\"https:\/\/www.highperformanceformat.com\/644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<!-- do not apply CSS styles to this element! --><\/p>\n<div class=\"pmc-paywall\">\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\tBen Jones, the actor turned politician best known for playing Cooter Davenport on \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/variety.com\/t\/the-dukes-of-hazzard\/\" id=\"auto-tag_the-dukes-of-hazzard\" data-tag=\"the-dukes-of-hazzard\">The Dukes of Hazzard<\/a>,\u201d died on Sunday from a heart attack, according to his wife Alma Viator. He was 84.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\tViator announced her husband\u2019s death in a <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/photo?fbid=10164904834969802&amp;set=a.10151583078464802\">Facebook post<\/a> on Sunday afternoon. With a photo of Jones holding his dog, she wrote, \u201cI lost the love of my life today. Ben passed from a massive heart attack. He was home resting in his favorite chair waiting for the Braves to come on and whoop the Yankees. Ben had the most amazing, rich, full life. He loved and was loved by so many. He will be missed. I loved him so much.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\tIn \u201cThe Dukes of Hazzard,\u201d Jones played Cooter Davenport, the Hazzard County mechanic and an honorary member of the Duke clan. Appearing in 142 episodes, Jones starred alongside Tom Wopat, John Schneider, Catherine Bach, Denver Pyle, Sorrell Brooke and Waylon Jennings.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\t\u201cDukes\u201d star Wopat paid tribute to Jones on social media. He wrote in a<a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/p\/Db1Ygw7AozZ\/?utm_source=ig_embed&amp;ig_rid=AT-mbMJPUTQBkTVdw230m4F\" rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\">n Instagram post<\/a>, \u201c\u2019The Dukes of Hazzard\u2019 lost another integral part of their cast today. Ben Jones was a fine friend and a fierce advocate of all the best things we can offer in the entertainment business. He will be sorely missed\u2026 Denver Pyle frequently said to Ben, \u2018I\u2019m not your Uncle Jesse!\u2019 But I feel like we lost a Duke cousin today.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\tIn 1988, Jones ran for Congress in Georgia\u2019s Fourth Congressional District and won by 20 points. He was reelected in 1990. Four years later, redistricting took his seat, and he lost his next race against Newt Gingrich.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<p><script async src=\"\/\/www.instagram.com\/embed.js\"><\/script><br \/>\n<br \/><script async=\"async\" data-cfasync=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/pl30214220.effectivecpmnetwork.com\/9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<div id=\"container-9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\"><\/div>\r\n<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Ben Jones, the actor turned politician best known for playing Cooter Davenport on \u201cThe Dukes of Hazzard,\u201d died on Sunday from a heart attack, according to his wife Alma Viator. He was 84. Viator announced her husband\u2019s death in a Facebook post on Sunday afternoon. With a photo of Jones holding his dog, she wrote,&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":35881,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/variety.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/MixCollage-09-Aug-2026-04-41-PM-5057.jpg?crop=0px%2C0px%2C1200px%2C675px&resize=1000%2C563","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-35880","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pics-news"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35880","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=35880"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35880\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/35881"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=35880"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=35880"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=35880"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}