of the wreckage disclosed that the aircraft was intact and the engine was developing substantial power at initial impact "No, I've got four records made," Cline responded. Also among the performers at the benefit shows were Hawkins, Copas,George Jones, George Riddle and the Jones Boys, Billy Walker, Dottie West, Wilma Lee and Stoney Cooper, George McCormick and the Clinch Mountain Boys. Hensely replied, "Just about.". Inside The Plane Crash That Killed A Country Music Icon. However, a childhood friend of George's has recently alleged that the singer's true cause of death was grief over the loss of his first love. She graduated from Oberlin College, where she earned a double degree in American History and French. As Phifer recalled, he was amazed how people immediately began to arrive on the scene after the crash site was located, taking what they could find from the Sweet Dreams singers scattered belongings and other wreckage. After playing a benefit concert in Kansas City, the Crazy singer and others all boarded a small plane. The rising star was only 30 years old at the time of her passing. On March 5, 1963, country music star Patsy Cline was killed in a plane crash near Camden, Tennessee pic.twitter.com/5b7eXapcHU, RetroNewsNow (@RetroNewsNow) March 5, 2018. Here are ten things you may not know about the country legend. Cline's legacy as one of the most influential voices in country music is as much notable for her cross-genre appeal into pop music and pioneering the Nashville Soundas it is for swearing with abandon and calling everyone she knew "hoss.". Theyd also heard Clines plane was four hours overdue for landing. She was Virginia from the Virginia coal country or, as she was called when she was younger, "Ginny." Cline went on to take the country music world by storm. Patsy Cline's (Virginia Patterson Hensley) plane crashed on 5 March 1963. Flying blind, he entered a graveyard spiral and accelerated straight downward. Their last stop for refueling was in Dyersburg, Tennessee, only 90 miles from home. Charlie was described as "pretty wild," with a "reputation for drinking, picking fights, and being a ladies man." John and Patsy Ramsey (Getty Images) Is she still a suspect in the murder? Patsy Cline was the perfect picture of a rural, blue-collar country music singer. The disease can have long-term effects on the heart, joints, and brain if not treated, and although very rare today, back in those days it was much more common and often fatal. But although she died young, Cline definitely left her mark on country music. Eventually, she went to bed and found out about the accident hours later. She was too afraid to face the potential repercussions of telling him. And Charlie and Patsy's fights were legendary. When they landed at that airport, they were only 90 miles away from home. The songreached No. Patsy Cline remains a much beloved singer, even though she died in 1963. Meanwhile, Cline had a reputation for being "loose," according to Sweet Dreams: The World of Patsy Cline. Surprisingly, 17 years after her death, Patsy Cline's version of the Irving Berlin classic broke the Top 20 on the Billboard Country Singles chart. Virginia Patterson Hensley, as she was born, was in the best singing form of her life when the . They were about 90 miles from their destination. The next day, Cline boarded Hughess plane at the Kansas City Municipal Airport. Advertisement. I remember that night that they just screamed and yelled when she did Bill Bailey. She sang the fire out of it like it had never been sung. Despite her own injured state, Cline insisted that the driver of the other car was treated for her injuries first. At 13, Patsy Cline was hospitalized with a throat infection & rheumatic fever, which affected her throat and changed her tone. She is considered one of the most influential vocalists of the 20th century and was one of the first country music artists to cross over into pop music. Patsy Cline was one of the fastest rising stars when her life was tragically cut short, but what most people did not know was that her journey to stardom wasnt smooth sailing. Patsy Cline didnt live to see what she could do for 1963. This article was most recently revised and updated by, Who Said It? About 1830, an aviation qualified witness near Camden, Tennessee, heard the sounds of an aircraft flying at low altitude, My problem was that I don't think I knew what love was.". Patsy married her first husband, Gerald Cline, in 1953. Omissions? In 1996, first responder, Jerry Phifer, gave an interview to share some perspective of the time around the crash. The most popular female country singer in recording history, Patsy Cline achieved icon status after her tragic early death at age thirty in 1963. She. She Knew Her Time Was Short. Shortly before Patsy Clines death in a grisly plane crash, the country music star made an eerie prediction. Rooted in Country: Suzanne Santo on Patsy Cline's 'I Fall to Pieces'. After she finished her performance, Cline returned to her hotel. adding that the medical examiner "has stated to the family that the most likely cause of death was congestive heart failure "I can still see her now as a five- and six-year-old, skipping down the street, singing at the top of her voice," recalled a family friend in the biographyHonky Tonk Angel: The Intimate Story of Patsy Cline by Ellis Nassour. Patsy Cline: The NTSB Report. 5, 1963, first responders arrived on the "very dreadful" scene assured on sight no one could have. They write new content and verify and edit content received from contributors. Ill never forget walking down that hill that morning, he said of coming onto the scene. This new Nashville Sound revived Cline's career, but she initially fought the cross-genre style. Patsys friends, Loretta Lynn and Ray Walker, have all since recalled Patsy telling them, months before her last performance, that she felt a sense of impending death. At 16 years old I had the privilege of traveling with him and really getting to know him, she said per the Peoples Defender. The Crash That Claimed Patsy Cline. The iconic country singer died in a plane crash while flying back to Nashville from a show in Kansas City, Kansas. Copas and Hawkins joined Cline and Hughes on the plane, which departed Kansas City at around 2PM. He remembered finding broken guitars, cowboy hats, and rhinestones strewn about and knowing theyd just found Clines plane. While the details of Clines plane crash are universally known, few know about the two near-death experiences she went through earlier in life. "This is a woman who barely had an eighth-grade education, came from a single-parent home, worked to make ends meet to help feed the family, and still figured out how to work the music business," said Barbara Hall, director of the documentary Patsy Cline: American Masters. When weather conditions prohibited Cline from flying out on March 4, West invited Cline to join her and her husband Bill on the 16-hour drive back to Music City. It took time and a new manager named Randy Hughes but Cline began to make a name for herself. He essentially forced the country music legend to learn to perform and pushed her on stage for the first time when she was 27. He'd once boasted of subsisting on "angel food". Phifer confessed to picking up a few items, too. Though she became known around the world as Patsy, Cline was born Virginia Patterson Hensley. Don't miss a story! Some of her personal belongings, including that watch, are on display in Nashvilles Patsy Cline Museum, per Rolling Stone. She thereby gained national exposure both for herself and for her song. A terrible car crash nearly derailed Patsys career on June 14, 1961. Clines life was cut short in March 1963 by an airplane crash that also killed fellow entertainers Cowboy Copas and Hawkshaw Hawkins. Times were tough for the Hensleys in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia during the Great Depression, but music was a constant. Godfrey required that only professional scouts not family bring talent to him to perform on the show, according to PBS' American Masters. "Until Patsy, no country female singer dared being smooth; they were all rough.". Country Singer. On one occasion, after he'd been drinking, he smashed jars of green beans because his dinner was late. Despite her dissatisfaction from the numerous restrictions found in her contract, including only allowing her to record songs written by Four Stars own writers, she achieved her first big hit, Walkin After Midnight.. She just froze and couldnt move, even thinking for a moment she was going into labor. She eventually met and married Hughes, Clines manager. The weather at Camden was reported as, "Ceiling 500 feet, visibility 5 miles.". "And while Patsy loved Charlie Dick to distraction, he was given to drink. The first of those experiences was when she was only 13 years old. Cline landed two more hits in 1962 with "When I Get Thru With You" and "So Wrong," which turned out to be some of the final hits of her lifetime. It is a shame that just a year earlier in March 1963 that many photos of the plane crash scene where Patsy Cline, Hawkshaw Hawkins, Cowboy Copas, and Randy Hughes, lost their lives, were not taken. I just made up my mind that Im not the only person in the world whose lost two loved ones at the same time, she said. Whereas the story of her loss of life is well-known to many music followers, [] Died. While sharing some of her own experience, Shepard also cleared the air on a longstanding rumor that she disliked Cline. Also on board were fellow perfomers Lloyd Estel Known in her youth as Ginny, she began to sing with local country bands while a teenager, sometimes accompanying herself on guitar. I copied this from a poor photo of the National . Hensleydrew on those hardships instead and even turned her first brush with death into a musical advantage. She died on March 5, 1963, in a plane crash in Camden, Tennessee. The pilot then Women Musicians, Artists, and Writers, https://www.britannica.com/biography/Patsy-Cline, Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum - Biography of Patsy Cline, Famous Singers - Biography of Patsy Cline, Encyclopedia Virginia - Patsy Cline (19321963), Patsy Cline - Student Encyclopedia (Ages 11 and up). She was laid to rest at Shenandoah Memorial Park in Winchester, Virginia, as she wished. [Pictures], Kelly Clarkson Stuns With Patsy Clines Shes Got You [Watch], Reba McEntires a Cappella Patsy Cline Cover Was a Long Time Coming [Watch]. when a B-25 Bomber made a wrong turn into the Empire State Building. Eventually, they did identify the Crazy singer and her remains were sent to her family in Tennessee for an in-home wake. Patsys plaque in the Hall of Fame paid tribute to her deep-rooted impact on country music. As they neared the actual site of impact, his hair stood up and he developed a funny feeling about the very dreadful site. 5, 1963, the plane carrying country stars Patsy Cline, Cowboy Copas, and Hawkshaw Hawkins crashed in Tennessee, killing everyone on board. She was joined by fellow country music stars Hawkshaw Hawkins and Cowboy Copas, as well as her manager and the pilot, Randy Hughes. The moment Patsy Clines plane crash killed her was recorded on her wristwatch which stopped at 6:20 PM, on March 5, 1963. Judgement of the pilot in initiating flight in the existing conditions. On March 5, 1963, Patsy was on her way back from a show in Kansas City when an intense rainstorm interfered with the light aircraft she was on, piloted by Randy Hughes. One issue was violence. Last modified on Tue 14 Feb 2017 13.12 EST. Copyright 2023 Endgame360 Inc. All Rights Reserved. When the plane carrying country stars including singer, Patsy Cline, went down on Mar. Cline's father Samuel Hensley died of lung cancer in 1956. All three were killed in a small plane crash near Clear Lake, Iowa, as they were traveling to Moorhead, Minnesota. The 58-year-old singer-songwriter, who won country music's first Grammy for a female vocalist died at 9:43 a.m. CDT, said Barbara Cramer, spokeswoman for Vanderbilt University Medical Center. Her mother, Hilda Patterson Hensley, was just 16 years old when "Ginny" was born, but her father, Sam Hensley, was in his forties when she arrived in the world. What if Hughes decided to wait out the bad weather? The plane left Dyersburg at a little after 6PM. She sings like an angel, and she looks like one. She was just beautiful. She only had two chart-topping hits to her name at the time of her death, but she went down in history as a country music legend. Its getting so even Cline cant follow Cline., Just one week before the plane crash that took her life, Patsy reportedly told singer Ray Walker that shes walking a fine line between life and death: Honey, Ive had two bad ones [accidents]. ", On March 3, 1963, Cline flew to Kansas City with her manager (the pilot) and two other country artists to perform at a fundraiser. Cline grew up as Virginia Patterson Hensley in Virginia in the 1930s. Her manager, Bill Peer, gave her the name "Patsy" from her middle name. Corrections? Known in her youth as "Ginny," she began to sing . Patsy Cline singing I Fall To Pieces on February 23, 1963, a few weeks before her death. Cline had several major hits during her eight-year recording career, including two number-one hits on the Billboard Hot Country and Western Sides chart. After that, he heard the crash. Patsy Cline may have had death on her mind, but her final days were full of life. That kind of negativity failed to deter. Cline came down with a throat infection and rheumatic fever, and had to be hospitalized. Non-instrument pilot attempted visual flight in adverse weather conditions, resulting in a loss of control. The plane crashed in the woods near Camden, Tennessee, approximately 90 miles outside Nashville, and killed everyone on board instantly. "I developed a terrible throat infection and my heart even stopped beating," the singer recalled in later years, according to Honky Tonk Angel. It instantly killed everyone on board, and the wreckage was only found the next morning. pilot taxied out and took off. Though enrolled in the local high school, Ginny never attended. As she sees it, that infection gave Hensley the memorable, booming singing voice that one day would find her "Walkin' After Midnight" on national television. A plane similar to the one in which Patsy Cline died. Patsy Clinewill always be the woman whose voice broke the mold and changed country music forever. For example, in sickle cell anemia, a single misplaced base pair on a gene causes a protein in red blood cells to become malformed. Singer Patsy Cline, who was killed in a crash of a Piper Comanche in 1963 (from the Autumn 2022 issue of Aviation History), was neither the first nor the last popular musician to die in an airplane crash.Here are some notable cases. Lloyd Cowboy Copas was 49 when he died. She posthumously received a Grammy Lifetime Achievement award and was the first female solo artist to be inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1973. But with the exposure and radio play of "Leavin' on Your Mind" and "Crazy," Cline was on her way to stardom. Birthplace. Accompanying Cline and Hughes were two other country singers, Hawkshaw Hawkins and Cowboy Copas. At 28, Cline and her brother were involved in a near-fatal head-on car crash. Patsy Cline died at the age of 30 on March 5, 1963. By 1957, the marriage ended, but the name stuck. According to the documentary, The Real Patsy Cline, Hughes was piloting the plane in bad weather, wasnt instrument-rated, and relying on visual perception. It was her final TV appearance. Patsy Clines Death on March 5, 1963, was a tragic day for the country music community. Cline's own career was all too brief. "And, rightly so. Born Virginia Patterson Hensley on Sept. 8, 1932, in Winchester, Virginia, Cline had suffered an unhappy and abusive childhood. The song recorded with Four Star under her minimal-royalties contract shot up the country charts and made the crossover to the pop charts too, a first for a female country artist at the time. Patsy Cline's career spanned a short five years with a scant few hits, yet her staying power nearly six decades later is a testament to the significant impact she's had on music, history, and gender equality. There was no evidence of preimpact failure or malfunction. Its never an easy time of year, she said. Patsy Cline, who had met him at a dance, once called him "hurricane in pants." Their relationship was full of love and arguments, even though Charlie Dick would recall that the arguments were short-lived. But the hyper-local fame didn't lead to instant renown. The plane crashed just outside of Camden, Tennessee, pilot inexperience and weather conditions the cause. that could have been a factor in the accident. Cline finally earned a membership in the Grand Ole' Opry, a lifelong dream of hers. 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