| I-35 Highway North / Nov 2003 |
| We're headed from a gig in Cedar Rapids, Iowa for the next date in Minneapolis. It's daytime, so I'm driving, blasting the Ramones. Ed wakes from a light sleep and asks me (apropos of nothing, I think at that point, maybe he was dreaming) "Where did Buddy Holly's plane go down?" "Clear Lake, Wisconsin?" I guess, trying to dredge up that particular bit of rock & roll trivia from the memory banks. "Clear Lake, Wisconsin, or Clear Lake, Iowa?" Ed replies. Sure enough, just 3 miles out of our way is Clear Lake, Iowa. We're hours early for the Minneapolis gig, we make a beeline for Clear Lake. Hit the exit, pull into a BP station, the 60-ish counter guy gives Ed not only directions to the Surf Ballroom where Buddy Holly, Richie Valens and the Big Bopper played their last gig, he also provides directions to the farmer's' field where the plane went down. ("Oh yeah, that's Cornell's place. He won't mind, it's the dirt road right out behind his barn, go down and take a look.") The crash site would bum me out way too much, we head for the Surf. The Surf Ballroom is still an active venue. I wish to God I had written down the next two acts booked to play there - all I remember is one was a current hat-boy country guy, the other was an 80's hair metal band. It's the middle of the afternoon, the parking lot's empty but we pull on the glass front doors and they open. The place isn't even locked. Ed and I wander around the Surf Ballroom for at least twenty minutes. We check out the original wood booths the Surf has kept preserved, we go through the dressing rooms with literally 50 years worth of band graffiti, we stand on the stage where Buddy Holly stood. We go behind the bar and wander through the little gift shop and never encounter a soul. We have to find our way upstairs to the office to locate a human being to pay for Surf Ballroom jerseys and Ian Hunter t-shirts. (Why were they selling Ian Hunter of Mott the Hoople t-shirts at the Surf Ballroom? I have no idea, they just were.) The guy we pay asks us if we want a tour of the place and we tell him we had our own tour. He does show us something we missed, the original telephone booth with the original dime dial payphone that Buddy Holly used to call his wife Maria Elena his last night on the planet. I almost cried, I swear to God. When we leave I ask the guy if he knows the front doors are unlocked. He just looks at me and says, "It's Clear Lake, we don't lock doors." All material © 2004 by Ric Cacchione, all rights reserved. |