To those who bought records like “Rocky Mountain High” and “Take Me Home, Country Roads” by the millions in the 1970s, John Denver was much more than just a great songwriter and performer. With his oversized glasses, bowl haircut and down vest, he was an unlikely fashion icon, and with his vocal environmentalism, he was the living embodiment of an outdoorsy lifestyle that many 20-something baby boomers would adopt as their own during the “Me” decade. There never was and there probably never will be a star quite like John Denver, who died on October 12, 1997 when his experimental amateur aircraft crashed into Monterey Bay on the California coast.
Born Henry John Deutschendorf, Jr., in 1943, not in the mountains of Colorado but in Roswell, New Mexico, John Denver rose to fame as a recording artist in 1971, when “Take Me Home, Country Roads” rose all the way to #2 on the Billboard pop chart. In fact, Denver already had a share in a #1 hit as the writer of “Leaving On A Jet Plane,” a chart-topper for Peter, Paul and Mary in 1969. But it was his 1971 breakout as a performer of his own material that made him a household name. Over the course of the 1970s, John Denver earned five more top-10 singles, including the #1 hits “Sunshine On My Shoulders” (1974), “Annie’s Song” (1974), “Thank God I’m A Country Boy” (1975) and “I’m Sorry” (1975). Even more impressive, he released an astonishing 11 albums that were certified Platinum by the RIAA, making him one of the most successful recording artists of the 70s, and launching him into a successful career in film and television as well.
By the 1990s, Denver was still a popular touring musician, though he was no longer recording new material with significant commercial success. Over the course of his career, he had become an accomplished private pilot with more than 2,700 hours on various single- and multi-engine aircraft, with both an instrument and a Lear Jet rating. On October 12, 1997, however, he was flying an aircraft with which he was relatively unfamiliar, and with which he had previously experienced control problems, according to a later investigation by the National Transportation Safety Board. At approximately 5:30 pm local time, after a smooth takeoff from a Pacific Grove airfield and under ideal flying conditions, Denver apparently lost control of his Long-EZ aircraft while trying to switch gas tanks several hundred feet over Monterey Bay, leading to the fatal crash.
A movie star and political activist as well as a musician, John Denver was one of the biggest stars of his generation, and is credited by the Recording Industry Association of America with selling more than 32 million albums in the United States alone.
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Kind of ironic, his father was a B-58 pilot.
Hubris.
He was flying an experimental aircraft he wasn’t familiar with and
when he switched gas tanks when one was getting low, he switched them all off
and lost power over Monterrey Bay too far to glide back. Crashed and drown.
Like all leftists, he thought he knew more than he did. He also put a 5,000
gallon gas tank in his Aspen compound during the 70’s OPEC embargo so he
had as much fuel as he needed while claiming to be a devout environmentalist.
A typical lefty hypocrite.
Annie’s Song was always my favorite.
He died so young.
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And then, Mooslims cut off his head.
And then, Mooslims cut off his head….
and attached it to a pole, and used it as a mop.
In one of the most surreal moments in the history of the Cold War, Russian leader Nikita Khrushchev pounds his fist on the table, and according to some reports, removes his shoe and threatens to pound a table with it in protest against a speech critical of Soviet policy in Eastern Europe.
During a debate over a Russian resolution decrying colonialism, a representative of the government of the Philippines charged the Soviets with employing a double standard, pointing to their domination of Eastern Europe as an example of the colonialism they were criticizing in their resolution.
https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/nikita-khrushchev-throws-a-tantrum-at-the-united-nations
Wasn’t his pilot’s license suspended at the time for alcoholism?
Also wasn’t he a greenie hoarding gas?
Legend.
I listen to his music almost daily.
I thought he did well in the movie “OH God” with George Burns.
I haven’t seen it. I’ll check it out.
His music was wonderful.
He wasn’t.
A manager at the company I worked at who also flew ultra lights told me (as if he had to) that anyone who runs out of gas flying one of those has to be incredibly stupid. Rocky Mountain High was the best for me.
Like this band’s cover of JD’s classic.
They have a pretty good rendition of The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly, too.
Worth a lookee see.
Aww, WTH. Here ya go.