after the event has recently claimed that he flipped the coin with Valens and won a spot on the plane but balked at the price. The Big Bopper, tired of folding his large frame into the uncomfortable bus seats and suffering with the flu asked Waylon Jennings if he could take his seat. Jennings, being a 21-year old session bass player acquiesced, perhaps out of respect for the older, more established performer or out of sympathy for him being sick. This left one seat remaining and it seems unlikely that if Jennings, who was not a headliner, had a guaranteed seat on the plane, that anyone other than Allsup would have had first choice. A coin was tossed at the Surf Ballroom, not at the airport prior to take off as depicted in the movie. Pretty much everyone there except for Dion swears that the coin toss was between Allsup and Valens for the final seat. At that moment it was assumed that Valens won the toss because it got him off the bus and on the plane… As a historical aside the coin landed heads. The Big Bopper had written two hit songs for other artist; “Running Bear” for Johnny Preston and “White Lightening” for country great George Jones. As a DJ at KTRM he broke a record (no pun intended) for continuous on-air broadcast of five days, two hours and eight minutes, playing 1,821 records.
196 | The World’s Hardest Music Trivia