Stories that belong on page one don’t always land there. On a cold February evening nearly 50 years ago, Minneapolis Tribune editors settled on a front-page lineup that included an outboard-motor theft ring, a nursing home strike, a failed missile test, a congressional hearing attended by two monkeys training for space flight, the resignation of the secretary of the Navy and a short about a bleacher collapse in Portsmouth, Va., in which 29 people were injured. The lead story: An American Airlines flight from Chicago to New York’s LaGuardia Airport crashed in the East River, killing 65 of 72 aboard.

The newsy mix is typical for the Tribune of that era, heavy on wire news, politics, crime and mayhem, leavened with a brite or two. What’s missing? Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and the Big Bopper were killed in a plane crash in northern Iowa early that morning of Feb. 3, 1959. Tribune editors decided that the deaths of three “rock ‘n’ roll idols” merited only this extended photo caption on page 11:

Singers Killed

These three rock ’n’ roll singing idols were killed Tuesday when their plane crashed near Mason City, Iowa, en route to play an engagement at Moorhead, Minn. Buddy Holly, 22, left, Ritchie Valens, 17, center, and J.P. (The Big Bopper) Richardson, 24, were killed along with the pilot of the chartered plane. The three took the plane after playing an engagement near Mason City so they could arrive early and get their clothes laundered. The rest of the troupe went by bus. The Moorhead performance went on last night although members of the troupe said they didn’t have the heart to perform. Some 1,000 advance tickets had been sold.

January 2007 update: The Associated Press reported this month that the Big Bopper’s remains will be exhumed and that his son, Jay Richardson, has hired a forensic anthropologist to look into how he died. Richardson hopes that the examination of his father’s remains will settle rumors that a gun might have been fired on board the plane, and tell whether the Big Bopper might have survived the crash impact and died trying to go for help. “I’m not looking for any great bombshell, but then again you never know,” Richardson told AP.

This entry was posted on Thursday, January 18th, 2007 at 11:57 pm and is filed under Main, Mayhem, People. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.