Wednesday, October 18, 2000:

Note: This story is from the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal archives. The story is a complete reprint from the original news feature. This web posting ©2001-2002, the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal. For more information about copyrights, view our web site.

From Lubbock Avalanche-Journal, February 2, 1997

Monday marks 38th anniversary of Holly's death

By WILLIAM KERNS
A-J Entertainment Editor

The past year has seen the debut of a full fledged Buddy Holly Music Festival in the Depot District, one supported by the city and attracting thousands. Perhaps more historically, it also found the name of a section of Avenue H that guides visitors through the entertainment district changed to Buddy Holly Avenue.

Lubbock has embraced its native son with an enthusiasm not so apparent since the unveiling of the life-size statue of Holly near the Lubbock Memorial Civic Center in 1979.

And it took a hit movie to inspire support for that project.

Monday marks the 38th anniversary of Charles Hardin "Buddy'' Holley's death. (Holley was his given name; the "e'' was dropped in a typographical error in his first recording contract and the shorter spelling stuck.)

Killed in the crash of a private aircraft on a snowycq Feb. 3, 1959, near Clear Lake, Iowa, were Holly, fellow rock 'n' roll stars Ritchie Valens and J.P. "The Big Bopper'' Richardson and often forgottencq pilot Roger Peterson.

Had he lived, Holly would be 60 today. He was born on Sept. 7, 1936.

Holly was just 22 when he died.

No one can accurately predict how the music career of Holly, who skyrocketed to fame in only two years, might have progressed.

But The Beatles took their name from Holly's band, The Crickets. And Holly historian Bill Griggs reported that Holly already planned to return to his home town, create his own recording studio and attempt to make Lubbock a magnet for good musicians.

A concert and dance continues to be held each year on or around Feb. 3 in Clear Lake. However, Lubbock's musicians and city fathers have opted to pay tribute to Holly each year on the day of his birth - Sept. 7 - and not, as songwriter Don McLean once wrote, on "the day the music died.''

However, Nancy Gray, executive director of the Lubbock Convention & Tourism Bureau, noted that two of her organization's marketing representatives, Aimeecq Martin and Nicole Robbins, are in Clear Lake today. They are distributing information about Lubbock's annual Holly celebration in September.

Both events attract the same fans,'' said Gray.