Fade away? Not Buddy!
QUESTION Is it true that Buddy Holly’s widow didn’t attend his funeral and has never visited his grave in Lubbock, Texas? Rock ’N’ RoLL legend Buddy Holly , famous for That’ll Be The Day, Not Fade Away and P eggy Sue, died in a plane crash on February 3, 1959, minutes after take-off from Mason city Airport, Iowa, with fellow performers Ritchie Valens and J.P. ‘The Big Bopper’ Richardson.
In New Y ork, two days after losing Buddy, his widow Maria Elena, barely five weeks pregnant, lost their baby as a result of the shocking news.
After a few hours’ observation, Maria caught a plane to Lubbock , Texas, for Buddy’s funeral. The service, at Lubbock Tabernacle church, drew a congregation of 1,500 people but, sick with grief and still in pain from her miscarriage, Maria Elena didn ’t feel able to attend the funeral, nor later visit Buddy’s grave just a mile from the basic wooden house where he’d been born.
‘I’ve never been to the gravesite,’ she said, ‘I refused to believe he was buried. I remembered him just as he was when he left our apartment in Greenwich Village.
‘To be honest, I’ve never been to a cemetery since my mother died when I was six. I try to remember people like the last time I saw them — alive. People go to Buddy’s grave to pay homage. I’ll never think of Buddy as being six feet under.’
A simple granite memorial commemo - rates Buddy under his real surname — Holley — changed due to a typing error on his first recording contract: ‘In loving memory of our own Buddy Holley September 7, 1936, February 3, 1959.’
Simon Myers, Offerton, Stockport. QUESTION What is the longest jail sentence? THE longest sentence handed down by a court is that imposed on chamoy Thipyaso of Thailand, who set up the Mae chamoy Fund (Mae being Thai for Mother) which was made to look like an oil share with high returns.
Effectively a pyramid scheme, it collapsed in the mid-Eighties, defrauding 16,231 people out of about £200 million. It’s thought some of her victims were members of the Thai Royal Family.
on July 27, 1989, she was sentenced to a record 141,078 years in prison. In the event, she served only about eight.
A similar technicality applied to terrorist otman el- Gnaoui, who was given a 42,924-year prison sentence by a Spanish court for his part in the 2004 Madrid train bombings that claimed 191 lives. His accomplice, Jamal Zougam, got 42,922 years. Spanish law limits the time that can be spent in jail to 40 years.
Another long stretch was handed down to oklahoma child rapist charles Scott Robinson. Judge Dan owens ordered his multiple 5,000-year sentences to be served consecutively — landing Robinson with a 30,000-year jail term.
The longest sentence ever received in the Uk is the 26 concurrent life sentences imposed on Andrew Aston at Birming - ham crown court in 2002. During three months in early 2001, the cocaine addict attacked and stole from 26 elderly and disabled people in their own homes.
He was convicted of two murders and 24 charges of robbery, surpassing that of the Birmingham Six who were wrongly convicted of the 1974 pub bombings and awarded 21 life sentences.
A.E. Davies, Monmouth. QUESTION British cinema names from a certain period seem to come from a pool that includes Odeon, Curzon, Savoy, Adelphi etc. Where did these names come from? FURTHER to the earlier answer , one name missing was that of the Essoldo cinemas. During W orld War II, former boxing promoter Sol Sheckman bought up cinemas nationwide and formed Essoldo circuit (control) Ltd, operating from Newcastle-upon-Tyne.
The southern part of the business was operated by his brother , captain Mark Sheckman, from London. He took control after Sol’s death in the late Sixties. At its height, Essoldo operated 160 cinemas.
The Essoldo circuit was very much a family concern: the name was made up from the first names of Sol’s wife, Esther, Soloman, and Dorothy, his daughter.
T. Smith, Newcastle-upon-Tyne.