Day Trips: Surf Ballroom and Museum, Clear Lake, Iowa

photos by Gerald E. McLeod

The Surf Ballroom and Museum in Clear Lake, Iowa, is still rockin’ more than 90 years after it opened.

The concert venue is renowned as the last place Lubbock native son Buddy Holly played before he died when his plane crashed in a cornfield north of town on Feb. 3, 1959. It is also known for the constellation of musical stars from Count Basie to Willie Nelson who have walked across its stage.

If you ever find yourself in northern Iowa between Minneapolis and Des Moines, preferably in the summer months, the museum and crash site are worth a visit.

Clear Lake is a picturesque town of 7,500 on the shores of a spring-fed lake. The community has a surprising amount of good restaurants and overnight accommodations.

The name and the club’s motif of palm trees and seaside murals were an attempt to bring a beach ambience to the landlocked Midwestern plains. By the late 1950s the ballroom had embraced rock & roll and the youth market.

After opening for Elvis Presley in 1955, Buddy Holly decided to follow the music. His big break came in 1957 when “That’ll Be the Day” and “Peggy Sue” topped the charts. Holly was on the Winter Dance Party tour when he played the Surf Ballroom. Tickets were $1.25.

Rather than take the bus to the next concert in Minnesota, the 22-year-old Holly chartered a small plane piloted by Roger Peterson to shuttle him, J.P. “The Big Bopper” Richardson, and Ritchie Valens. The plane crashed soon after takeoff in a frozen cornfield 5 miles north of town.

Mapping software will guide you to the crash site less than 2 miles off of I-35. A well-worn path through the cornstalks takes you to a small shrine where the plane went down. It’s a place to say thanks for the brilliant talent that was extinguished too soon.

1,738th in a series. Everywhere is a day trip from somewhere: Follow “Day Trips & Beyond,” a travel blog, at austinchronicle.com/daily/travel.