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07-11-1999, 10:52 AM
Anyone know if Buddy Holly's death plane was named "American Pie"? My dentist was telling me he'd heard this, and he seemed disbelieving -- as though it was spooky or something. I couldn't respond at the time, and when he was done, I'd forgotten about it. But I got to wondering -- so what if that was the name of the plane - the song came later, so it doesn't strike me as weird, spooky, or anything that (if it's true) the song is titled the same as the plane's name --or am I missing something here? Now, if that was the name of the plane, but the song came first -- now THAT would be spooky!

07-11-1999, 11:02 AM
"Enola Gay"

07-11-1999, 01:46 PM
As far as I know, the airplane didn't have a name. It was a Beechcraft Bonanza as I recall, and airplanes that small typically aren't named.

Lyrnyrd Skynyrd's airplane was called 'Free Bird", and that crashed and killed several members of the band.

07-11-1999, 02:31 PM
To read more SDMB comments, go here:

http://www.straightdope.com/ubb/Forum1/HTML/000105.html

07-11-1999, 05:56 PM
The plane that Buddy Holly died in was the American Pie, I learned that in Sophmore English, when we disected Don McLean's song as part of our poetry section.

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The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.
-- Henry David Thoreau

07-11-1999, 07:02 PM
Sometimes we learn things that aren't true. I remember in second grade, we were memorizing a poem about how the sun rises in the east and sets in the west. The teacher explained a little about how the sun moves around the earth. I found this disconcerting, or maybe I was just a wise guy, because the science books I was reading claimed it was the other way around. I voiced my objection, and the teacher stated that no, the sun really did go around the earth. I still don't know whether the teacher believed this or just didn't want to go off on a tangent from her curriculum.

07-11-1999, 09:50 PM
Yes, you're right, jens, sometimes teachers tell us things that aren't necessarily true (a practice which should be wholly abolished, it's totally counter-productive). But, I know I've heard this in other places, I just can't think of any right now.

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The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.
-- Henry David Thoreau

07-11-1999, 10:20 PM
I'll have to say it was not American Pie
http://snopes.simplenet.com/music/artists/amerpie.htm

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Has anyone seen my keys?

07-12-1999, 10:11 AM
One of "The Three Stars" killed in the crash, J. P. Richardson, aka "The Big Bopper", had two top forty hits. Chantilly Lace is his best known, but he had a second minor hit called The Big Bopper's Wedding. I heard this song for the first time that I remember over the weekend. In it, the Big Bopper is telling his shotgun-wielding prospective father-in-law that he does not want to go through with the wedding. The song ends with the sound of a single shot...

07-13-1999, 07:13 AM
Hmmm...there doesn't seem to be a consensus on this. I have done some searching of the web with no luck. I may actually have to go the library and get a biography for a definitive answer.