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Public domain image via Wikimedia Commons (General Artists Corporation-photo by Van Dyck).
ADDRESS & CONTACT
Address
Forest Lawn Memorial Park, 4955 Pine St, Beaumont, TX 77703
GPS
30.12304, -94.10009
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He had the flu, a bad seat on a freezing bus, and a hit record. So J.P. Richardson asked Waylon Jennings for his seat on a small plane. The Big Bopper gravesite at Forest Lawn in Beaumont marks where that bargain ended. A bronze statue and a long historical marker now greet visitors at the end of a quiet cemetery road.
Richardson came into the world in Sabine Pass in 1930. His family soon settled in Beaumont, where he played football for Beaumont High. Then he spun records at KTRM radio while studying at Lamar College. College kids were doing a dance called the Bop. So Richardson started calling himself the Big Bopper.
A Radio Man Makes the Charts
He had big ideas, and he had them fast. In 1958 he cut “Chantilly Lace” for Houston producer Pappy Daily. The song roared up the pop charts and stayed for months. Meanwhile, he wrote songs for others too. George Jones took his “White Lightning” to No. 1, and Johnny Preston did the same with “Running Bear.”
Then came the Winter Dance Party tour of the frozen Midwest. On February 3, 1959, the plane went down in an Iowa cornfield. Richardson, Buddy Holly, and Ritchie Valens all died. Waylon Jennings carried that night forever, as TMM’s story “I Hope Your Old Plane Crashes” tells.
A Second Burial
Beaumont buried its hometown star under a flat plaque in 1959. But rumors about the crash never died. So in 2007, his son Jay hired forensic anthropologist Bill Bass to examine the remains. Bass found no evidence of foul play. Afterward, the family reburied the Big Bopper in a new casket beside his wife.
The new site gave fans something the old one never had. Now a life-size statue and a Texas marker tell his story. You don’t have to hunt among the flat stones anymore.
Richardson was 28, building a home studio and dreaming of owning a radio station. Instead, he became one-third of The Day the Music Died. Stand by the statue a moment. That big, booming laugh still seems to roll in off the Neches River.
