007 Buddy Holly Remembered – Part 1

Bob Smith 0:00
60 years ago this February a plane carrying one of Rock and roll’s first singer songwriters crashed. Some called it the day the music died today on the off ramp Buddy Holly remembered

Hi and welcome to the off ramp with Bob Smith. One day early in my career as a young broadcaster interviewing singers and musicians, I realized that again and again I was running into people who knew or who worked with Buddy Holly man who survived his death that winter morning in February of 1959 and went on with their lives. I was too young to remember Buddy Holly I was only eight when he died. So he was a legend. It had been 20 years since rocks first singer songwriter had had his life cut short and his stature had grown significantly. Fortunately, I was working in Iowa where Buddy Holly played his last concert. The second Buddy Holly Memorial festival was scheduled to take place at the surf Ballroom in Clear Lake. That’s where buddy’s last concert took place. So I decided to attend. And there I met yet another person who had a connection to Buddy Holly. This time it was Nikki Sullivan, one of buddy Holly’s guitarist. After I got home, I decided to do a special on these middle aged men who had known and worked with Buddy Holly and their youth. And that’s what today’s show is all about. Buddy Holly remembered

Unknown Speaker 2:02
the day when you say goodbye

Unknown Speaker 2:07
when you made me cry.

Unknown Speaker 2:11
You know it will be the day

Speaker 1 2:15
back in July 1957. I first heard That’ll be the day. And today that is still my favorite record. I’ve heard it every day in my life since 1957. Numbers

Speaker 2 2:23
never, never any pressure to be perfect. But he never demanded of us. I think he did of himself but not out loud. He tried very hard to do. To do what made him happy. The music really was a reflection of his personality and of his life. It wasn’t just, you know, a few lines strung together for commercialism. It wasn’t that at all. It was really folk music of a solid

Speaker 3 2:47
februari made me shiver. With every paper I 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. Something touched me deep inside the day. The day die.

Bob Smith 3:22
It wasn’t until 21 years after that fateful plane crash near Clear Lake Iowa that an important piece of Buddy Holly memorabilia came to light in 1980. Searching through some evidence drawers in the basement of the Mason City Iowa courthouse. The Cerro Gordo County Sheriff Jerry Allen found a wristwatch belonging to JP Richardson, known in the 1950s as the Big Bopper, and eyeglasses belonging to Buddy Holly. They were in an envelope it was

Speaker 4 3:49
from an old coroner’s inquest dated back in 1959, and it had the name of Charles harden Holly and two other members of the group Richie Valens and Giles Richardson and the envelope contained What are obviously Holly’s glasses and presentation wristwatch that belonged to Richardson, who is better known as the Big Bopper at that time,

Bob Smith 4:18
what’s the Could you describe the glasses there? What shape are they in after all these years and being hidden away in that court records are

Speaker 4 4:24
the glasses the frames are intact of course the lenses are gone, and they bear some scratches and damage which probably no doubt came from the from the crash itself. The one always is broken loose, but the bowser intact. It’s it’s the distinctive glasses that he wore was the white boson, the angular heavy frame, glasses frame itself. There’s no question that that’s in my mind that that’s Whose they are, the envelope shows a receipt date of seven April of 59, which is several months after the crash, of course, happened on February 3. And I’m just making a wild guess that this property was turned in at a later time, very possibly was picked up at the Grace scene. When the snow cover disappeared. This property was not turned into the sheriff’s office. It was no doubt given to the coroner. And this was placed in in a dead storage area in the basement of this courthouse. And that’s where it was. We were looking for some court reporters notes, which they did use part of this drawer for some old notes. And I didn’t find the information I was looking for. But I guess on something a little more significant. The glasses which I think we’ll be, well, I know there’ll be turned back to the family whether it’s buddy Holly’s widow or his mother. That’s up to them, but at least the stuff will not be put out on the market is there’s an item

Speaker 5 6:12
Why do you miss when my baby kisses me?

Speaker 5 6:24
Why do you miss my baby kisses? Legends

Bob Smith 6:29
belong to the people but somebody has to safeguard that legend protecting it from harm, misuse and faulty memories. The Buddy Holly legend is in the hands of a Connecticut man Bill Griggs, who formed the Buddy Holly Memorial society back in 1975. Buddy

Speaker 1 6:45
Holly was an original he did not copy somebody else. He went out and did his own thing. He was one of the few singer songwriters of the 50s most of the artists came along and did somebody else’s music and that was it. Chuck Berry, buddy, Holly and a few others were the original singer songwriters. They wrote their own songs performed their own songs. But he was not afraid to try something new. He would experiment with strings, he would double track his voice on a mono tape record, which was hard to do back in the 50s. I really really admire him for that. And ever since it occurred That’ll be the day for the first time of July 1957. Having a love with a man.

Bob Smith 7:18
As with every cult figure memorabilia, posters, pictures and recordings of Buddy Holly draw record prices. I

Speaker 1 7:24
am also a record collector and I were approaching fast 700 different records and Buddy Holly from around the world on my personal collection. I just got a 10 inch LP from Holland for $765 and that’s the most I’ve ever paid up to date. It’s called country wise it’s the buddy and BOD days the very early days before the DECA days before the cricket days. 200 repressed as a legitimate press over in Holland. It’s been on my whitelist for years and years. I finally got it

Bob Smith 7:50
as keeper of the Buddy Holly flame. Bill Greg says he found the movie The Buddy Holly story to be an enjoyable one. But he does say three major inaccuracies in the film.

Speaker 1 8:00
They left out buddies producer Norman petty, they left out one of the crickets Nicki Sullivan. Now there was a reason in the first book by John Gore Rosen. John had not met Nikki at the time, and they were not any quotes from the book. And I think that was the reason because the movie was very loosely based on the book. But they left a cricket out of the movie there were three crickets when they first started. The other one of course was the way they depicted buddy’s parents and his preacher Ben Johnson in the movie is preacher was behind them 100% His parents were behind them 100% I liked the movie was very, very enjoyable. It was fairly factual. There were three major mistakes in the movie and a lot of little ones but until something else comes along, it’s our movie.

Bob Smith 8:35
There is a word for people like Bill Griggs, it’s fan from the word fanatic. And if there ever was a Buddy Holly fanatic in life, it must be Bill Griggs back

Speaker 1 8:45
in July of 1957. I first heard That’ll be the day and today that is still my favorite record. I’ve heard it every day in my life since 1957. It’s

Speaker 6 8:53
so easy to fall in love. It’s so easy to fall in love.

Speaker 5 9:07
People tell me he loves her foods, so here I go breaking all of the losing seems.

Bob Smith 9:16
Even though he was just reaching a peak of popularity after only a few years on the charts at the time of his death, buddy Holly’s contributions to rock and roll music were immense. Many people didn’t realize that at the time, but some did for British musicians known as The Beatles did, and they recorded several of his songs and talked about him whenever buddy Holly’s name was mentioned. In fact, the Beatles reverence for Buddy Holly was so strong that they recorded words of love at the same tempo and in the same key as Holly listen first to buddy Holly’s original version of words of love.

Unknown Speaker 9:57
Tell me how you The L below this

Bob Smith 10:06
and now the Bebo version

Unknown Speaker 10:24
me close

Bob Smith 10:39
interest in Buddy Holly among musicians stayed far ahead of that of the public Eric Clapton’s band blind faith broke up in the late 1960s. But before that time they recorded their own version of well, all right, and Don McLean told the story of American music and American pie with Buddy Holly as the central focus of the sun. But it was the Beatles who brought Buddy Holly back to the attention of many young Americans that

Speaker 2 11:01
had a lot to do with it. I know I’d heard a couple of buddy songs before the Beatles came along. But I think I really did become interested at the time of the British Invasion when the Beatles and The Rolling Stones and Herman’s Hermits and Peter and Gordon everybody was doing his songs. And I can remember DJs playing bodies version and then playing the new version and that did get me interested in going back and listen to the album’s

Bob Smith 11:23
that’s John Gould Rosen who in the early 70s sat down to write the Buddy Holly story, the book which was translated into a movie in 1978, with Gary Busey as its star. What sparked gold Rosen’s interest in Buddy Holly, well,

Speaker 2 11:36
I first began listen to his music in the early 60s, I’m not quite old enough to go back to the 50s. And his songs meant a lot to me, there was a lot of content and impact to the songs. And I guess my desire to write a book simply grew out of the fact that there was nothing available in Buddy Holly back in the 50s. There was no Rolling Stone, interviewing the people, nobody writing reviews of concerts. And it’s very little written down. And, and somehow I, I needed to know if buddy meant the music in the way in which I took it and what kind of person could create such music and that’s really why I went out and did the work I did on it.

Bob Smith 12:12
John traveled to Texas and spoke at length with many of buddy, Holly’s friends, business associates and relatives in his research,

Speaker 2 12:18
when I got when I did reach out and contact these people, I really didn’t encounter any resistance. At the time, there wasn’t a whole lot of interest in Holly generally. And most of these people had not been interviewed before at Lane, so it was kind of fresh for them. And once they felt that I was sincere in what I was doing, then their attitude was that they wanted a truthful and accurate book on body written. People like the crickets and his family, really loved Buddy Holly, and they wanted people to know what kind of person he was. And that was, to me the most interesting part of doing the book is sure I found out about what song was recorded when and who was on and all that business. But to find out what kind of a human being Buddy Holly was, and to try to present that to people that was the most challenging part.

Bob Smith 13:02
So what type of human being was Buddy Holly?

Speaker 2 13:05
I don’t think I’d really thought through before I began it, what kind of person I expected to find. I did find that I think the music really was a reflection of his personality and of his life. It wasn’t just, you know, a few lines strung together for commercialism. It wasn’t that at all. It was really folk music. It was solid. And I think what surprised me maybe is to realize how creative he was to realize that he he did have a command over his performances and over his recordings that he was a thoughtful person I think he’s the kind of person who would have been a success and anything he turned his mind to.

Unknown Speaker 13:38
And now oh boy with bloody holiday. And it’s crickets

Unknown Speaker 13:46
you don’t know when you’re with me

Speaker 6 13:58
all my life I’ve been awaiting to be know when you’re with me, or call me shadow my heart I’m gonna see my baby. My love. You don’t know when you want me to see that? Over

Bob Smith 14:41
if you were to have looked at the little town of Clear Lake, Iowa back in 1959, or even today, you might wonder how such a community could attract such a major musical star as Buddy Holly.

Speaker 2 14:54
He was asked to do this tour. This was a tour of about two weeks laying through the Midwest. Just on a package show, I believe he did the tour partly as a favor to the booking agency, they needed a top name on the bill. I don’t think he wanted to go out in the middle of winter. He’s a Texan. And this weather went to place them in any case, his wife was pregnant, he wants some time off. But one of the reasons was as a favor to the booking agency, plus he was getting started and some new projects and he just wanted the cash. And clay like was one of the stops on the tour, they played a lot of small towns like clear, like, it’s really remarkable to look at that schedule. And I couldn’t even try to pronounce some of the names of the towns that embarrass myself. But from coming here again last year, and I guess clear, the clear like ballroom, and the others in this region, Minnesota and Iowa, a part of it sort of Dancehall circuit. And it’s really amazing to see how people will turn out in the middle of winter for concerts like this. They did have good crowds on these concerts. And you gotta remember back in the 50s, that rock and roll then they couldn’t always play every day in a big city they had to fill in with some of these small towns, they didn’t get that much money for these tours. So if they could draw 1000 to 2000 a night that was a good crowd.

Unknown Speaker 16:14
Oh long time for God. Dreams

Bob Smith 16:17
are just as it is when anyone dies buddy Holly’s friends and family had to pick up and keep going after that night in Clear Lake Iowa. One of the young men who played for a time in buddies last band another Texas boy named Waylon Waylon Jennings went on to become a country music singer and in the 1970s blossomed into a major country music superstar. At times he took Jerry Allison and Joe Malden to have buddies former crickets on tour with him. Most people who watch The Mary Tyler Moore comedy show during the 1970s were unaware that the man who wrote and sang the opening theme for that show was Sonny Curtis, who also was a member of the crickets, who

Speaker 5 16:59
can turn down with her smile. Sonny

Bob Smith 17:03
Curtis went through the late 50s Writing songs like walk right back for the Everly Brothers and I fought the law in the 1960s He scored a hit again in 1980 with the real buddy Holly’s story. The name of Bob Montgomery came up in a conversation with singer Bobby Goldsboro in 1980. Bob Montgomery was the name of a fellow who formed a country and western band with Buddy Holly before the crickets were born, but Bobby Goldsboro was talking about a bob Montgomery who was gold’s Burroughs business partner, a man who CO produced some of Bobby Goldsboro his Greatest Hits Songs like watching Scotty grow and honey.

Bobby Goldsboro 17:40
Well, Bob is he and I have a publishing company in Nashville, House of gold and we we published behind closed doors and big songs over the last few years. But Bob also is a producer. He’s produced several records on other artists and got several records on the country charts right now that he produced. He’s very active in producing, writing and publishing.

Bob Smith 17:59
Where’s he from?

Bobby Goldsboro 18:00
He’s from Texas, originally.

Bob Smith 18:01
Is he anything to do with Buddy Holly, there was a BB gun vomit

Bobby Goldsboro 18:03
gunnery. He’s same guy that started out with Buddy Holly writing songs and, and he knew buddy in fact, he tells us stories about buddy all the time. Sonny Curtis, and who’s one of the the creek you know, they’re touring as the crickets now Sonny Curtis and and who else? Jerry, Allison, Jerry Allison. They are all good friends of mine have seen a lot. Another

Bob Smith 18:23
singer Bobby V remembers Buddy Holly in a different way. It was due to buddy Holly’s death and that plane crash that Bobby V got his first big break in showbusiness, your band was asked to step in that night at a date. What in Moorhead.

Bobby Vee 18:37
That’s right in 1959. Buddy Holly died and, and he was enroute to my hometown to do a concert up in Fargo. And the radio station had decided to go ahead with the show and asked for any local bands that would come down and help fill in. So we did we opened the show that night. And we just played that one evening with that particular show. But that was there was a guy in the audience that that started booking us and we eventually made a record and things kind of took off from there. How

Bob Smith 19:05
old were you that night when you stepped in for the crickets and your band did the show you’re what 1617 I was 1515. Right? Your brother Bill was a composer and guitarist in the grip

Bobby Vee 19:18
right? He was the lead guitar player and he was kind of the the organizer of the band. He was oldest one in the group. I think he was 20 or 19, something like that. So So

Bob Smith 19:25
you were all pretty young at the time, right? Yeah. Scott Turner music industry professional who eventually produced slim Whitman Vikki Carr, Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings also worked with Buddy Holly in his early years, they even wrote music together. And during an 1880 interview, he produced sheet music from a song he and Buddy wrote before either became famous

Speaker 7 19:46
in their stead lyric, and this is the scrawling that I wrote this was done in the backseat of a car going back from a show. It had never been published it now remember back in the 50s, we wrote what we call the formula songs, you know, little things. Do you want a dance in the middle of things like that? And this one is, if you close the door to your heart, and you lock your love in behind it. Well, how in the world, my sweet girl, am I ever going to find it? Oh, sweet girl, don’t hide your love. You gotta let me know what you’re thinking of. Please let me know it’s not a game. And I’ll put some fuel on the burning flame. And if you close the door to your heart, and you lock your love behind it. Well, how in the world? Oh, sweet girl, am I and that’s the way it goes. I

Bob Smith 20:32
can see it sounds like a little bit muddy.

Unknown Speaker 20:35
You know? It’s all through there. Scott Turner,

Bob Smith 20:37
Waylon Jennings, Sonny Curtis, Bobby Goldsboro, Jerry Allison, Bob Montgomery, Bobby V. These are men whose lives were in one way or another, influenced by Buddy Holly. And they went on in the music business. But what about those who dropped out along the way? Coming up, we’ll tell you the story of a cricket who retired the story of Nikki Sullivan. Well, all right. So

Speaker 5 21:05
I’m being well, all right. Let people know about the dream. Sam wishes you in the night with lights. Well, all right. All right.

Unknown Speaker 21:28
All right.

Speaker 8 21:36
This is Rodney King, at our WGBH teen time microphone we have with us Buddy Holly. Hi, buddy.

Unknown Speaker 21:42
Hi, Ronnie. How are you? Pretty good. Thank

Speaker 8 21:44
you, buddy. Could you tell us some of the big records that you and your group have had? Uh, well,

Speaker 9 21:48
we’ve had, that’ll be the day it was our first one. And Peggy Sue followed it. Along with Oh boy, and maybe baby. Early in the morning, ladies 20 It’s so easy.

Speaker 8 21:59
You saw quite a bit. Do you know the total number of all your rockets how much they’ve sold. So

Speaker 9 22:03
we don’t have any idea running? What so we figure somewhere around four or 5 million somewhere around four or

Speaker 8 22:09
5 million tremendous volume of records. How did you happen to get started? Well, we

Speaker 9 22:14
met in high school, I guess you say in Lubbock, Texas. It’s our hometown, and we all went to the same high school there and started playing together. Long

Unknown Speaker 22:23
starstay How old are you?

Unknown Speaker 22:26
I’m 22.

Speaker 8 22:29
Listening to you, buddy. It seems like y’all could do something in jazz. Have you ever tried anything along that line?

Speaker 9 22:34
No. Isn’t it strange that you should say that? Because we’ve always made it a point to more or less? Not like jazz? Actually, it’s kind of in the in conjunction with rock and roll in one way and then it’s kind of against it? In a way Yeah, that’s so true. I

Speaker 8 22:52
didn’t mean to imply that your music you’ve played so far. I don’t know for some reason you sort of strike me as a jazz man for some reason?

Speaker 9 22:58
Well, it’s probably the glasses or something

Unknown Speaker 23:02
they brought back man do you have any special plans for the future? And

Speaker 9 23:07
no, we don’t we did. In the way of bookings. We don’t know what’s coming up for us after this tour. The last night of this tour is three nights from tonight and in Richmond and then new release will be out in a few days it’s a curl release entitled heartbeat back with will all right

Speaker 8 23:25
heartbeat that’s the number we’ll have to watch for finally, Buddy you know there’s many mediums of that you can present yourself to the entertainment field at such as a stage in the records nightclubs. Which do you prefer the most? I prefer

Speaker 9 23:39
the one neither tourists such as we’re on the larger than blues type package shows.

Speaker 8 23:44
You feel that you can get the most out of your audience. Yeah,

Speaker 9 23:48
you can you can do your four or five songs and, and really, I mean, feels good to play to an audience that’s watching instead of an audience it’s either interested in something else like in nightclubs you know, there’s a lot going on. Sometimes they’re interested in something says you act on stage and then in your dances, will they’re more interested. They’re dancing, of course.

Speaker 8 24:08
Yes, you feel your audience a lot more. Thank you, Buddy Holly and the Crickets.

Bob Smith 24:14
You’re listening to the off ramp with Bob Smith. Coming up the story of a cricket who retired Nicky Sullivan.

We hope you’ve enjoyed part one of our buddy holly remembered special and that you’ll join us again for part two next time here on the off ramp. Thanks for listening.

The off ramp with Bob Smith is produced in association with CPL, radio and the Cedarbrook public life Prairie Cedarburg Wisconsin

Transcribed by https://otter.ai