Eddie Cochran
Born in Albert Lea, Minnesota, Cochran's family moved to the West
Coast in the late 1940s, where Eddie began playing guitar and doing
session work. He also teamed up with Hank Cochran, singing as The
Cochran Brothers, though they were not related.
About this time Eddie met producer and writer Jerry Capehart and
together they began a fruitful partnership, beginning with Eddie's
first solo single, Skinny Jim, which was cut for a local label
called Crest. Thanks to Capehart, Liberty Records heard and signed
Eddie Cochran in 1957.
Eddie developed a huge following in Europe, as did Gene
Vincent. So a tour of the UK together in 1960 represented the peak
of their acceptance on the road.
On April 17 - while driving to London for a flight back to Los
Angeles after a riotously successful British tour - Cochran and
Vincent were involved in a car accident on the A4 (Great West
Road) near Chippenham, Wiltshire. Cochran's fiancée Sharon Sheeley,
and the car's driver (a man called George Martin!) were injured in the crash, as was
Vincent, but
Cochran was thrown through the windscreen when the car careered into a
lamp post after a tyre blow-out.
He was taken by ambulance to Bath Hospital but died without regaining consciousness.
One of the policemen attending the event was one David Harman (Later
Dave Dee of Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky Mick and
Tich).
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