Buddy Holly’s widow selling off memorabilia

DALLAS – Feb. 3, 1959, was the day the music died for a nation and the hopes of one young bride fell to pieces.

Now, 47 years after the winter plane crash that killed rock ‘n’ roll pioneer Buddy Holly, his widow has begun to think again of the future, and about who will preserve her husband’s legacy once she no longer can.

“I’m not getting any younger,” said Maria Elena Holly, now in her 70s. “That’s one thing I learned from Buddy’s death. Once you go, you don’t know what will happen.”

That’s why Holly said she’s arrived at a difficult decision – selling some of Buddy’s possessions.

“I want to make sure the fans have a chance to get them,” she said. “Buddy’s fans should have them.”

Holly is keeping her most precious keepsakes, and many others will remain on display at the Buddy Holly Center in his hometown, Lubbock, Texas. But the upcoming sale – organized by Dallas’ Heritage Auction Galleries – offers devotees an alluring opportunity to own a small piece of rock’s roots.

Buddy’s diamond and engraved watch, which was pulled from the plane wreckage, is one of the most valuable pieces at auction, and officials said it could sell for six figures.

Big fans with smaller pocketbooks will find chances at acetate recordings and handwritten letters. There’s a shirt in Buddy’s favorite color of blue, his passport signed with his birth name, Charles Holley, and black-and-white snapshots of Buddy as a youngster in Lubbock with his dog, Ralph.

Online bidding has begun, and the floor auction will take place at the auction house April 14 and 15.

“Forty-seven years later, Buddy’s presence in music is still being felt,” said Doug Norwine, Heritage Auction’s director of music and entertainment memorabilia. “This isn’t about his death. This auction is about celebrating his life.”

Holly’s life with Buddy began on a Friday morning in 1958 when the lanky musician in dark-rimmed glasses walked into the recording company where Maria Elena worked.

Part of her job – and natural talent – was to charm clients as they waited, and it worked well on Buddy.

He immediately began pestering Maria Elena, who was then training to be a professional dancer, for a date.

“My aunt told me not to get involved with the musicians. She said they’re not all well in here,” Holly said, tapping a diminutive finger against her temple. “They are unstable.”

But Buddy, already famous for his songs “That’ll Be the Day” and “Peggy Sue,” got permission from her aunt, and Holly said she found herself out with the “very good-looking” young man as soon as the workday had ended.

She said their connection was instant – and explosive.

“It was some attraction that I can’t explain,” she said. “He said that he felt he had known me his whole life, and I felt like that, too.”

Within two weeks, the two were married.

But the union was soon torn apart.

Buddy was killed six months later on tour. Musicians Ritchie Valens and J.P. “The Big Bopper” Richardson were also killed on the plane headed from Clear Lake, Iowa, to Fargo, N.D.

Holly had not gone on the tour because she was pregnant. She later miscarried.

For two decades, Holly did not speak publicly of Buddy. She remarried, had three children and closed a door on that part of her past.

But her family persuaded her to reopen it, telling her it was her duty to share those memories. Now she can talk of her life with Buddy for hours, although she said she still can’t play his music.

He wrote the hit “True Love Ways” for her as promise of their future life together.

“It still gets very difficult at times. I’d exchange all this here,” she said, motioning toward some of Buddy’s possessions in the auction house, “just to have him back for a moment.”