Friday marked the 10 year anniversary of the death of John Denver, who was killed when the Long-EZ aircraft he was piloting ran out of fuel off the coast of California. Investigations later attributed the crash to modifications made to the plane and Denver's lack of experience in flying the plane. After his death, the Governor of Colorado ordered all Colorado flags lowered to half-staff to honor Denver.
My siblings are all older than I, in fact, my brother, the oldest is 14 years my senior. Both he and my sister (10 years older than I) were big fans of John Denver, who was at the peak of his career during their late teenage years. Denver was planning a concert in the New York area and my sister wanted to go in the worst way. Tickets were hard to come by and my father talked to friends about securing tickets.
A colleague of my father's had a connection and worked to get tickets. He ultimately called my father and told him, "Yeah, I think I can get some tickets for that concert the kids want to go to, you know for that "John Colorado" guy." John Denver had been renamed and in our family, from that point on, he was always "John Colorado."
In his song, Rocky Mountain High, there is a line, "they say he got crazy once and tried to touch the sun." Rest well, Mr. Colorado, your music continues to entertain us.
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