Death
After the February 2, 1959, performance in Clear Lake, Iowa, Holly, Richardson and Valens flew out of the Mason City airport in a small plane that Holly had chartered. Valens was on the plane because he had won a coin toss. The plane, a three-passenger Beechcraft Bonanza, departed for Fargo, North Dakota, and crashed shortly after takeoff in a snow storm. The crash killed all three passengers and the pilot Roger Peterson. At 17, Valens was the youngest to die on the flight. The event, along with Buddy Holly's death, inspired singer Don McLean's popular 1971 ballad "American Pie," and immortalized February 3 as "The Day the Music Died." Ritchie Valens is interred at San Fernando Mission Cemetery in Mission Hills, California.
Read more about this topic: Ritchie Valens
Famous quotes containing the word death:
“Death destroys a man: the idea of Death saves him.”
—E.M. (Edward Morgan)
“Nor has his death the world deceiv’d
Less than his wondrous life surpriz’d;
For if he like a madman liv’d
At least he like a wise one dy’d.”
—Miguel De Cervantes (1547–1616)
“On the death of a friend, we should consider that the fates through confidence have devolved on us the task of a double living, that we have henceforth to fulfill the promise of our friend’s life also, in our own, to the world.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)