As in the excellent movie Lincoln (2012), we generally picture Abraham Lincoln full-grown as the great president. So it is easy to forget that he grew up as a child living in the wilderness dealing with normal family issues. One of the struggles of the young Abraham’s life was that he and his father Thomas Lincoln were very different.
Michael Burlingame’s detailed two-volume biography, Abraham Lincoln: A Life (2008), noted that many contemporaries of the Lincolns reported that the father and son did not get along. The friction may have been partly created because Thomas lacked ambition and disdained the fact that his son sought to educate himself.
The young Abraham was not afraid to speak up around strangers to ask precocious questions, and his father would often whip the young boy for his assertiveness. One time, the young Abe received a beating for releasing a bear cub from one of his father’s traps.
As the young Abe grew into a man, he continued to dislike his father. When Lincoln became a lawyer in Springfield, Illinois, he never invited his father to visit him.
And, when Thomas was dying in 1851 and asked his son to visit him, the son refused, telling his step-brother to tell Thomas, “if we could meet now, it is doubtful whether it would be more painful than pleasant.” Lincoln did not attend Thomas’s funeral or put a tombstone on the grave. Two years later in 1853, though, Lincoln named his fourth son after his father. The beloved child would soon be nicknamed “Tad.” (Burlingame, pp. 10-11.)
Fathers and Sons in Song
It is speculation to wonder how Lincoln’s relationship with his father affected his later life. But the father-son struggle helps us humanize a man we know as an icon etched in stone. His father-son dynamic is not unusual, as sons strive to find their places in the world. And this struggle occasionally appears in films like Field of Dreams (1989), as well as in popular songs such as Harry Chapin‘s “Cats in the Cradle.”
One of the best father-son songs is by Cat Stevens, now known as Yusuf Islam. The beautiful “Father and Son,” which appeared on Tea for the Tillerman (1970). Yusuf Islam originally wrote the song for a play that was never completed.
The song is a conversation between father and son where the son tries to explain to his father why he is leaving. When Yusuf Islam recorded the song, he had only experienced being a son. But by the time he did the following performance, which appears to be from 2015, he was a grandfather, giving the song new meaning.
Bruce Springsteen has spoke openly about his own difficulties with his father Douglas “Dutch” Springsteen. He has captured that complicated relationship in songs such as “Adam Raised a Cain,” from Darkness on the Edge of Town (1978), “My Father’s House” from Nebraska (1982), and “Independence Day,” from The River (1980). The latter song, like “Father and Son,” is about a son leaving his father.
Springsteen’s “Independence Day” is slightly more bitter than “Father and Son.” The bitterness may come from the fact that Springsteen had a rockier relation with his father than Yusuf Islam did. But it is also a heavyhearted father-son conversation.
In the above video from 1980, Springsteen begins by telling the audience how the music he heard on the radio inspired him to seek a different life, just as Lincoln’s books inspired him. Similarly, as in Lincoln’s message to his dying father, the singer in “Independence Day” tells his father “Papa go to bed now, it’s late. / There’s nothing we can say can change anything now.”
As Springsteen learned as he got older, the sins of the father also makes the man that the son becomes. So, for this celebration of Abraham Lincoln’s birthday, remember the man’s first years with his father. One may look back on Thomas Lincoln for his faults in the way he treated our beloved Abraham Lincoln. But the father, struggling to carve out a place for his family in the wilderness, did something right because his son turned out pretty well.
Ultimately, the son Abraham, perhaps remembering Thomas’s lack of ambition or remembering his own beatings, carried his concerns for the suffering of others with him when he left on his own Independence Day and when he went to the White House. And although Abraham Lincoln had a long way to travel for his own education, maybe The Great Emancipator contained a little of the boy who saw a suffering bear cub and freed it, knowing he would face his father’s wrath but defying his father anyway.
{Photos via: me, taken around the 1990s. The statue is located at New Salem, Illinois. The farm is the place of Abraham Lincoln’s birth in Hodgenville, Kentucky.}
What is your favorite song about fathers and sons? Leave your two cents in the comments.
DNA tests revealed that the body of King Richard III had been found last year in a municipal parking lot in the English city of Leicester. Richard, who Shakespeare portrayed in a less than flattering light, was the last English King to die in battle, dying at the Battle of Bosworth Field. After his death in August 1485, his body was put on display and then he was quickly buried near a church without much fanfare.
Since the discovery, scientists have used the body to make a 3D model of the way Richard might have looked. But Richard’s days of being involved in battles are not over. While Leicester plans to give Richard a new burial more fitting of his life’s station, the city of York, where Richard was from, is arguing that it should take charge of Richard’s burial. Richard belonged to the House of York, which was part of the the ruling Plantagenets.
Shakespeare and others have painted Richard III as a villain who murdered his two nephews. That version of Richard has been played by many stellar actors, including Laurence Olivier, Ian McKellen, and Al Pacino. Some historians, though, have argued that history has treated Richard unfairly. While the new discovery will not end the debate, it did resolve one issue, showing that Richard’s curved spine did not create a hunchback as described by the Bard of Avon in the play written in 1592. At the end of Shakespeare’s play, Richard III, we see Richard exclaiming, “A horse! a horse! My kingdom for a horse!” before he is killed. Interestingly, he would end up spending decades not with horses, but with cars out in a parking lot.
Singer-songwriter Guy Clark wrote “Out in the Parking Lot” with Darrell Scott, who has penned a few hits himself. While I have loved the music of other Texas songwriters from the Clark’s era like Townes Van Zandt, it is only recently where I have started to appreciate Clark’s body of work. One of the songs I have been listening to during the last several months is Clark’s “Out in the Parking Lot,” which appears on several Clark albums including Songs & Stories (2011).
As Clark explains in this performance in a bar in Homer, Alaska from 2003, he wrote the song about the parking lot of a bar in West Texas. But the song strikes universal themes, and anyone who has been in a parking lot outside a bar late at night recognizes the scene. There have been many songs about honky tonks, bars, and pubs, but nobody else has captured the mixed emotions ranging from anger to joy to pathos that stirs just outside the action of the drinking establishment, out in the parking lot. There, “Some have given up, some have given in / Looks like everybody’s lookin’ for a friend / Out in the parking lot.”
While Guy Clark has never had the mainstream popularity of big Nashville artists, there are some folks in Nashville that have good taste, such as Brad Paisley, who covered “Out in the Parking Lot” on his Time Well Wasted album from 2005. Alan Jackson joined Paisley in bringing this excellent song to a wider audience.
While I like Paisley’s work and I am glad he brought the song to a wider audience, I hope it ended up bringing some fans to Guy Clark’s great body of work too. While I cannot guess as to which version Richard III might prefer, I suspect his body saw many of the same scenes in his parking lot.
“Now everybody’s gone, they’ve shut out all the lights / The dust begins to settle and it’s never been so quiet / Out in the parking lot.”
Do you know any other songs about parking lots? Leave your two cents in the comments.
The U.S. Postal Service is issuing a new Forever stamp later this year that will feature country singer Johnny Cash. The stamp will be the first in the Postal Service’s new Music Icons series, although it has not announced the date for the Cash stamp yet.
The Postal Service explains that the stamp is designed to look like a 45 rpm record sleeve. Frank Bez took the photo during a photo shoot for the album, Ring of Fire: The Best of Johnny Cash (1963). Greg Breeding designed the stamp.
And what better way to celebrate the news than with one of my favorite Johnny Cash songs from his American Recordings period, “Tear-Stained Letter.” The song, written by Cash, appeared on 2003’s American IV: The Man Comes Around, but it actually goes back much further. Another version of the song appeared on Cash’s 1972 A Thing Called Love, which apparently was never released on CD (but is available as an MP3).
The original 1972 version of “Tear-Stained Letter” is a slow sad song, as a lover makes one last attempt to win back his love. But Cash reworked the song for the 2003 version, adding some new lyrics and upbeat music. With the changes, Cash turned the sad plea into a message to make the ex-lover feel guilty (“I’m gonna to bring back to your mind / What you said about always being true.”). Here is the updated 2003 version.
Here is the 1972 version of “Tear-Stained Letter.” (Note that the Johnny Cash song is not the song of the same name written by Richard Thompson and recorded by other artists like Jo-El Sonnier and Patty Loveless).
Now, whether sending a sad or happy tear-stained letter, you can include Johnny Cash on the envelope taking the letter on its journey to your lost love. Or you can just use it to pay your bills. Which version of “Tear-Stained Letter” do you like best? Leave your two cents in the comments.
It was not that long ago when for our World Series songs we featured “San Francisco Bay Blues.” Now, we find ourselves again having to come up with a song for a San Francisco team. With the San Francisco 49ers in the Super Bowl this year, we feature a song with a title that fans in the city by the Bay will be screaming come Sunday. “Save Me, San Francisco” is the title track off of the 2009 Train album that also featured their huge hit “Hey, Soul Sister,” thus setting the record for songs on an album with unnecessary commas.
I have a love-hate relationship with Train. Some of their songs get overplayed on the radio, so I end up with them stuck in my head. But I cannot deny they can produce some excellent pop songs with great hooks. And lead singer Pat Monahan — who co-wrote the catchy “Save Me, San Francisco” — has a great voice.
The video for “Save Me, San Francisco” is a play on the Dustin Hoffman classic movie, The Graduate (1967). But in the Train video, when the man chasing his beloved gets to the alter, he finds a twist ending that plays on a political issue that has been in the news in California and elsewhere. And in case you were wondering, the members of Train have been outspoken in support of the type of marriage that occurs at the end of the video.
You can check out the ending to The Graduate on YouTube. Or check out the funny Wayne’s World 2 (1993) spoof on the same race-to-the-church segment. But this Sunday, the San Francisco 49ers hope they will not be left standing at the alter of victory.
What is your favorite song about San Francisco or your favorite nod to “The Graduate” ending? Leave your two cents in the comments.
February 3 marks the anniversary of the day Buddy Holly, J.P. Richardson, and Ritchie Valens perished in a plane crash. You probably know the general outline of “the day the music died.” But you may not know the controversy surrounding the legendary coin flip connected to the tragedy.
The Day the Music Died
In early 1959, Buddy Holly, J.P. “The Big Bopper” Richardson, Ritchie Valens, and Dion and the Belmonts toured through the Midwest in what was called “The Winter Dance Party.” Also on the tour was Holly’s new back-up band replacing the Crickets: Tommy Allsup on guitar, Waylon Jennings on bass, and Carl Bunch on drums.
Some of the performers were tired of traveling through the cold in an old bus that kept breaking down. The poor conditions led to drummer Bunch going to the hospital with frostbite. So Buddy Holly chartered a small plane for one of the upcoming trips on the tour.
After their February 2, 1959 performance in Clear Lake, Iowa, three of the stars — Holly, Richardson, and Valens — boarded a three-passenger plane. The plane took off in the early morning hours of February 3 for Fargo, North Dakota but soon crashed in a snow storm.
All three passengers were killed along with the pilot Roger Peterson. The young rock and roll music industry lost three of its brightest stars.
The Competing Claims About a Coin Toss
Although the story is familiar, there is still an ongoing question. Besides Holly, how did Richardson and Valens end up on the plane instead of the other headliner, Dion, or instead of other band members?
Stories conflict about the events that night before the flight. Everyone agrees there was a coin toss. But survivors still debate who was the person who barely missed getting on a plane ride to their death, all due to the luck of a coin flip.
Holly’s former band members tell one story. But Dion wrote in his book The Wanderer Talks Truth (2011) that the events “have been completely eclipsed by urban legends, cinematic retellings, gossip, and outright grandstanding.” (p. 41).
Who is telling the truth? Let’s consider the different versions of the story.
On a Behind the Music episode, “The Day the Music Died,” the producers presented the story that Buddy Holly planned for the airplane to the next stop on the tour for him and his two musicians, Waylon Jennings and Tommy Allsup. In the video, Waylon Jennings explains how he gave up his seat on the plane to the ailing Big Bopper. Jennings recounts that Holly had ribbed him about taking the bus. Jennings responded, jokingly, “I hope your ole plane crashes,” a retort that haunted him for years.
In the same episode, guitarist Tommy Allsup recounts how when he went inside to make sure they did not leave anything behind, he ran into Ritchie Valens. Then, Valens asked Allsup if he could take Allsup’s seat on the plane. Allsup then claims he flipped a coin, and Valens won the seat on the ill-fated plane.
In other venues, Tommy Allsup repeated his version of the story of the coin toss that he lost to Ritchie Valens.
Bob Hale, the emcee at the Surf Ballroom in Iowa for the last Winter Dance Party show before the plane crash, has a similar recollection. Hale remembers that Allsup suggested the coin flip. But Hale recalls that he was the one who flipped the coin for Allsup and Valens. Hale remembers that Valens won by calling “heads.”
Allsup, however, argues that Hale was not present at the coin flip. [February 2013 Update: See the comments section below for Mr. Hale’s comment on this post.][January 2017 Update: Tommy Allsup passed away on January 11, 2017.]
Dion has yet another version of the events leading to the plane ride. According to Dion’s website:
“Dion was, in fact, scheduled to fly in the fateful plane that went down. The headliners flipped a coin to see who was going to fly. The Big Bopper and Dion won the toss. Then he discovered that the flight would cost $36 — the exact amount of rent his parents paid monthly. He said, ‘I couldn’t bring myself to pay a full month’s rent on a short flight. So I said, ‘Ritchie, you go.’ He accepted and took my seat. Only the four of us knew who was getting on that plane when we left the dressing room that night. Of those four, I was the only one who survived beyond February 3, 1959.'”
In his book The Wanderer Talks Truth, Dion explains that through the years he watched others (presumably Allsup who he never names) exaggerate their role. Dion asserts that he only came forward to correct history when the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame contacted him about the conflicting stories.
Filmmakers created a documentary about the tour that includes Dion’s memories. 2015 Update: The Winter Dance Party video interview with Dion has been completed and is posted below. Dion’s explanation of the coin toss involving Holly, Vallens, the Big Bopper, and him begins at around 42:20, although the entire video is worth watching for his memories of the tour.
Readers of this blog know I am a Dion fan, so I hate to believe that he is lying. And to a large extent, one may wonder why, as the fourth headliner, discussions of the fated tour often exclude mention of Dion.
Then again, one may give some weight to Ritchie Valens’s sister, Connie Valens Lemos. She sides with Tommy Allsup on the issue.
The Movie Versions of the Coin Flip
The two major films about two of the stars on the tour do not add any insight. The Buddy Holly Story (1978) avoided the issue altogether. That movie ends with Buddy Holly on stage in Clear Lake, Iowa on the fateful night, playing his hits and having fun on stage.
At the end of The Buddy Holly Story, Ritchie Valens and The Big Bopper join Holly on stage for the final song, leaving us with a happy moment. As in many retellings of the story, the film does not mention the fourth headliner, Dion.
The film about Ritchie Valens, La Bamba (1987), also excludes all mention of Dion. A scene of a marquee on the final tour does not even show Dion’s name.
La Bamba takes some additional literary license with the events leading up to the flight. Regarding the coin toss, in the first mention of the planned flight, the Big Bopper tells Valens (Lou Diamond Phillips) that Holly reserved the plane for the headliners. This conversation in the film is consistent with Dion’s story.
But later in the movie La Bamba, it shows the group standing next to the plane. There, Holly explains he is flipping a coin to decide whether Ritchie or “Tommy” gets to go. “Tommy” is also called “Allsup” in the scene, so the movie follows the Allsup-Valens coin toss story. But La Bamba moves the private toss between the two men to one conducted by Holly on the airfield. Allsup has criticized the movie’s fictionalized version of the coin flip.
What Really Happened?
Is Allsup telling the truth? And did Dion’s imagination insert the singer deeper into the story of “the day the music died”? It is easy to imagine a toll on Dion from decades of hearing about the music dying when he survived. For decades, the tales surrounding the tragedy often have excluded that tour headliner.
Or is Dion telling the truth, which would mean that Allsup and Waylon Jennings are wrong? And what about Hale’s version that he flipped the coin?
Arguments Supporting Allsup’s Version
Between Allsup and Dion, there is no way to be sure who is telling the truth. But some factors weigh in favor of Allsup. Since Holly arranged for the flight, it seems like he might first ask his friends and band-mates Allsup and Jennings. This conclusion makes sense considering the band had lost drummer Carl Bunch for a while due to to frostbite.
Also, Allsup’s wallet was found among the wreckage. Allsup explains that before the coin toss, he had planned to go on the flight. So he gave Holly his identification so Holly could pick up his mail waiting in Fargo. Still, even if Allsup had not planned to fly at some point, he could have given his wallet to Holly for the same reason.
One strong argument for Allsup is that he consistently has told the same story since the crash. And most stories by other people are largely consistent with Allsup’s version of the coin flip. Bob Hale confirms that the coin flip involved Allsup and Valens, even though Allsup and Hale disagree about who actually flipped the coin. Jennings’ story also is more consistent with Allsup’s.
Jennings’s story about Allsup seems truthful because he would have no motivation to make up a story that makes him look bad with his joking taunt about the plane crashing. Still, under Dion’s version, Jennings and Holly still could have had the exchange even if Jennings had not been one of the original passengers.
Arguments Supporting Dion’s Version
On the other hand, some reasons support Dion’s version of events. Holly might have asked the headliners first, expecting they most likely would be willing to have the money for the expensive flight.
Also, according to Larrry Lehmer’s book, The Day the Music Died, Holly had asked Jennings to open for him in England but told Jennings that he was not going to tour in England with Allsup because he was going to get back together with his original Crickets. So maybe Allsup would not be the first person Holly would ask on the flight.
There are other reasons why Holly might have first invited the headliners. For example, Valens and Richardson were both sick, so Holly might have asked them first, then included the other headliner, Dion.
Waylon Jennings does remember that Dion was especially angry about the poor conditions of the bus that kept breaking down (Lehmer, p. 67). Thus, Holly might have thought that Dion would be the first to jump at the chance to fly. And Holly played drums for Dion for their last show, so they might have talked about the flight.
Finally, there are questionable reports that Holly, Valens, and Richardson flew in a plane on some legs of the tour before the fateful trip. (Lehmer, p. 224) If true, it seems Holly was flying with the headliners, not his band members. If true, that practice would support the conclusion that Dion was invited on the final flight. On the other hand, many dispute the stories about other flights and even Dion does not remember any other flights.
Trying to Put It All Together
Larry Lehmer’s well-researched book is in the Allsup camp, recounting the version from Jennings and Allsup without mentioning the Dion controversy. Lehmer also quotes Carroll Anderson, the manager of the Surf lounge and the person who first contacted the pilot Roger Peterson, as saying that Holly said he wanted to get a flight for him and his band. (p. 95.)
Maybe some combination of the stories is true. Maybe there was a coin toss among all of the men and Allsup and Dion both “lost” out on seats of the plane.
Or maybe there were two coin tosses. Under both Allsup’s and Dion’s stories their coin tosses happened in different places at different times. Under this scenario, maybe Dion had a seat that he declined because of the cost. Then later there could have been a coin flip between Valens and Allsup.
If that is not enough controversy for the day, some people claim that the plane crash itself should be re-investigated. Some go as far to say that foul play was involved in the crash. But we will leave those “mysteries” for another day.
Of course, the only people who know how these passengers were selected are Tommy Allsup, Dion, and Ritchie Valens. Whatever happened, the survivors’ trauma of hearing the news of the crash probably affected memories. Thus, it is likely both Allsup and Dion actually remember the story in different ways. Neither of the men is probably intentionally lying.
Ultimately, to paraphrase Don McLean’s “American Pie,” all of this arguing about the coin toss just may be keeping Satan laughing with delight. It may not matter who lost the coin toss that night. Those who won the toss and those who were on the plane constituted our great national loss. What do you think happened with the coin toss? Leave your two cents in the comments.
As in the excellent movie Lincoln (2012), we generally picture Abraham Lincoln full-grown as the great president. So it is easy to forget that he grew up as a child living in the wilderness dealing with normal family issues. One of the struggles of the young Abraham’s life was that he and his father Thomas Lincoln were very different.
As the young Abe grew into a man, he continued to dislike his father. When Lincoln became a lawyer in Springfield, Illinois, he never invited his father to visit him.
album from 2005. Alan Jackson joined Paisley in bringing this excellent song to a wider audience.
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February 3 marks the anniversary of the day Buddy Holly, J.P. Richardson, and Ritchie Valens perished in a plane crash. You probably know the general outline of “the day the music died.” But you may not know the controversy surrounding the legendary coin flip connected to the tragedy.
, Dion explains that through the years he watched others (presumably Allsup who he never names) exaggerate their role. Dion asserts that he only came forward to correct history when the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame contacted him about the conflicting stories.
, Holly had asked Jennings to open for him in England but told Jennings that he was not going to tour in England with Allsup because he was going to get back together with his original Crickets. So maybe Allsup would not be the first person Holly would ask on the flight.
