J.P. “Big Bopper” Richardson – Oct. 24, 1930 – Feb. 3, 1959 (age 28)
Buddy Holly – Sept. 7, 1936 – Feb. 3, 1959 (age 22)
Ritchie Valens – May 13, 1941 – Feb. 3, 1959 (age 17)
On February 3, 1959, a plane traveling from Mason City, IA to Fargo, ND crashed in the middle of the night, killing all those on board, including singers Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and The “Big Bopper .”
The tragedy has been memorialized in Don McLean’s song American Pie. As this Geeks of Doom article points out, McLean “…used the tragedy as not only a metaphor for a chapter closing on American music that fateful day, but also as an allegory on a chapter turning in American history, a kind of innocence lost…”1
But February made me shiver
With every paper I’d deliver.
Bad news on the doorstep;
I couldn’t take one more step.
I can’t remember if I cried
When I read about his widowed bride,
But something touched me deep inside
The day the music died.
1Remembering February 3, 1959: ‘The Day The Music Died’
