Remembering Rick Nelson

He went from Mary Lou to playing a Garden Party

Image of screenshot from Howard Hawks movie ‘Rio Bravo’ — Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons

New Year’s Eve marks the 36th anniversary of the death of Rick Nelson. Like other music legends Otis Redding, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Buddy Holly, Patsy Cline, and Jim Croce, he was to perish in an aviation accident whilst out on tour.

Rick Nelson had started a comeback tour with Fats Domino in 1985. After shows in Florida and Guntersville, Alabama, he and his band took off for a New Year’s Eve extravaganza at the Park Suite Hotel in Dallas, Texas. The flight was delayed due to rain and some engine problems with his Douglas DC-3 plane.

Near the Texas border, outside De Kalb, smoke was detected in the cockpit and the pilot asked for emergency landing fields. The pilot managed to put the plane down in a cow pasture, but the on-board fire, caused by a suspected faulty in-cabin heater was intense.

Rick Nelson and six others — including several band members and his fiancee Helen Blair — were killed in the accident. The pilot, and his co-pilot, although severely burned, survived.