The Day the Music Died
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This article is about the plane crash. For other uses, see The Day the Music Died (disambiguation).
Monument at the crash site, September 16, 2003
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| Accident summary | |
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| Date | February 3, 1959 |
| Summary | Controlled flight into terrain |
| Site | Near Clear Lake, Iowa, United States 43°13′12″N 93°23′0″WCoordinates: 43°13′12″N 93°23′0″W |
| Passengers | 3 |
| Crew | 1 |
| Fatalities | 4 (all) |
| Aircraft type | Beechcraft Bonanza |
| Operator | Dwyer Flying Service, Mason City, Iowa |
| Registration | N3794N |
| Flight origin | Mason City Municipal Airport |
After terminating his partnership with The Crickets, Buddy Holly assembled a new band consisting of Waylon Jennings, Tommy Allsup, and Carl Bunch, to play on the '"Winter Dance Party" tour. The tour also featured rising artists Ritchie Valens and The Big Bopper, who were promoting their own recordings as well. The tour was to cover 24 Midwestern cities in three weeks.
The distance between venues and the conditions prevalent aboard the poorly equipped tour buses adversely affected the performers. Cases of flu spread among the band members, and Carl Bunch was hospitalized due to frostbite. Frustrated by the conditions, Holly decided to charter a plane when they stopped for their performance in the Surf Ballroom in Clear Lake, Iowa, to reach their next venue in Moorhead, Minnesota. Carroll Anderson, owner of the Surf Ballroom, chartered the plane from the Dwyer Flying Service. Richardson, who was affected by the flu, swapped places with Waylon Jennings, taking the latter's place on the plane, while Tommy Allsup lost his place to Ritchie Valens on a coin toss. Dion DiMucci (of Dion and the Belmonts fame) decided not to board the plane for the $36 fee.
The investigation of the incident determined that soon after take off, a combination of poor weather conditions and pilot error caused spatial disorientation that made pilot Roger Peterson lose control of the plane. Hubert Dwyer, owner of the flight service company, could not establish radio contact and reported the aircraft missing the next morning. He took off in his own Cessna 180 and spotted the wreckage less than six miles (9.7 km) northwest of the originating airport in a cornfield. He notified the authorities who dispatched Deputy Bill McGill, who drove to the wreck site and found the bodies of the passengers and pilot. They were later identified by Carroll Anderson.
Contents
Background
The tour began in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, on January 23, 1959. The amount of travel created a logistical problem with the tour. The distance between venues had not been considered when scheduling each performance. Adding to the disarray, the tour bus was not equipped for the weather. Its heating system broke down shortly after the tour began, in Appleton, Wisconsin. While flu spread among the rest of the performers, Holly's drummer, Carl Bunch, was hospitalized in Ironwood, Michigan, for severely frostbitten feet. The musicians replaced that bus with a school bus and kept traveling.[4] As Holly's group had been the backing band for all of the acts, Holly, Valens, and DiMucci took turns playing drums for each other at the Green Bay, Wisconsin, and Clear Lake, Iowa, performances.[5]
On February 2, the tour arrived in Clear Lake, where they were to play at the Surf Ballroom. The venue had not been a scheduled stop, but the tour promoters, hoping to fill an open date, called Surf Ballroom manager Carroll Anderson and offered him the show. He accepted and they set the show for that night. By the time Holly arrived at the venue that Monday evening, he was frustrated with the tour bus. Holly decided to charter a plane to take him to Fargo, North Dakota, so the party could pick them up to the next stop in Moorhead, Minnesota, to avoid traveling in the bus, and to have enough time to do laundry.[4]
The plane
Carroll Anderson called Hubert Dwyer, owner of the Dwyer Flying Service, a company of Mason City, Iowa, to charter the plane to get to Fargo, North Dakota.[6] Flight arrangements were made with Roger Peterson, a 21-year-old local pilot. The flying service charged a fee of $36 per passenger for the single-engined, 1947 Beechcraft Bonanza 35 (V-tail), N3794N.[7] The Bonanza sat three passengers and the pilot.[8] Richardson had contracted flu during the tour and asked Waylon Jennings for his seat on the plane. When Holly learned that Jennings was not going to fly, he said in jest, "Well, I hope your ol' bus freezes up." Jennings responded, "Well, I hope your ol' plane crashes," a humorous but ill-fated response that haunted Jennings for the rest of his life.[9]Ritchie Valens, who had once had a fear of flying, asked Tommy Allsup for his seat on the plane. Allsup and Valens decided to toss a coin to decide.[6] Bob Hale, a DJ with KRIB-AM, was working the concert that night and flipped the coin in the ballroom's sidestage room shortly before the musicians departed for the airport. Valens won the coin toss for the seat on the flight. Dion had been approached to join the flight, although it is unclear exactly when he was asked. Dion decided that since the $36 fare (equivalent to US$288.30 in 2014)[10] equaled the monthly rent his parents paid for his childhood apartment, he could not justify the indulgence.[11]
Crash
Dwyer, the owner of the plane and the flight service company, who had witnessed the takeoff, decided to establish radio contact, but all attempts were unsuccessful.[13] Later that morning, when Hector Airport in Fargo, North Dakota, had not heard from Peterson, Dwyer contacted authorities and reported the aircraft missing. Dwyer took off in his Cessna 180 and flew Peterson's intended route. Within minutes he spotted the wreckage less than six miles (9.7 km) northwest of the airport.[16] The Sheriff's office dispatched Deputy Bill McGill, who drove to the wreck site.[15] The bodies of Holly and Valens lay near the plane. Richardson's body was thrown over the fence and into the cornfield of Juhl's neighbor Oscar Moffett. Peterson's body was entangled in the plane's wreckage.[16] With the other participants on "The Winter Dance Party" en route to Moorhead, it fell to Surf Ballroom manager Carroll Anderson, who drove the musicians to the airport and witnessed the plane's takeoff, to make positive identifications of the musicians.[17] The county coroner Ralph Smiley declared that all four had died instantly from "gross trauma" to the brain.[16]
Investigation
2007 investigation
In 2007, Richardson's son had his father's body exhumed and an autopsy performed to verify the original finding. This was done, in part, because of the long-known discovery of Holly's .22 caliber pistol by Juhl in the cornfield two months after the wreck. This gave rise to the question of whether an accidental firearm discharge had caused the crash, and whether or not Richardson was not hurt as badly and tried to crawl for help, since his body was found farther from the crash site. William M. Bass undertook the procedure and confirmed Smiley's original report. The well-preserved body of Richardson showed "massive fractures from head to toe" confirming that he also died on impact.[18][19]Aftermath
Holly's pregnant wife, María Elena, watched the first reports of his death on television. A widow after six months of marriage, she miscarried the following day, attributed to "psychological trauma". His mother, who heard the news on the radio in Lubbock, Texas, collapsed. Because of María Elena's miscarriage, the authorities, in the months following, implemented a policy against announcing victims' names until after families are informed.[1] María Elena Holly did not attend the funeral, and has never visited the gravesite. She later told the Avalanche-Journal: "In a way, I blame myself. I was not feeling well when he left. I was two weeks pregnant, and I wanted Buddy to stay with me, but he had scheduled that tour. It was the only time I wasn't with him. And I blame myself because I know that, if only I had gone along, Buddy never would have gotten into that airplane."[20]Waylon Jennings and Tommy Allsup continued the tour for two more weeks, featuring Jennings as the lead singer.[21] Meanwhile, Holly's funeral was held on February 7, 1959, at the Tabernacle Baptist Church in Lubbock.[22] The service was officiated by Ben D. Johnson, who had presided at the Hollys' wedding just months earlier. The pallbearers were Jerry Allison, Joe B. Mauldin, Niki Sullivan, Bob Montgomery, Sonny Curtis, and Phil Everly.[23] Holly's body was interred in the City of Lubbock Cemetery. His headstone carries the correct spelling of his surname (Holley) and a carving of his Fender Stratocaster guitar.[24]
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Memorial
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