Moorhead, Minnesota 1978 film "The Buddy Holly Story" as the next stop in the ill-fated Winter Dance Party tour. Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and The Big Bopper died in a plane crash "en route" to their scheduled performance at the Moorhead Armory Building from Clear Lake, Iowa on February 3, 1959. Moorhead's pioneer Prairie Home Cemetery on 8th Street was the inspiration for the name of Garrison Keillor's national radio program, "A Prairie Home Companion". Although Keillor thought the cemetery was founded by Norwegian Lutherans, in fact it was organized in 1875 by the Rev. Oscar Elmer, a Yankee Presbyterian minister who
Don McLean California's Stagecoach Country Music Festival. In May 2015, McLean undertook his 20th nationwide tour of the UK and Ireland. In 1991, McLean returned to the UK top 20 with a re-issue of "American Pie". Iona College conferred an honorary doctorate on him in 2001. In February 2002, "American Pie" was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame. In 2004, McLean was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame. Garth Brooks presented the award and said, "Don McLean: his work, like the man himself, is very deep and very compassionate. His pop anthem 'American Pie' is a cultural phenomenon". Two years