If you took out a map of the United States and traced a line
beginning at New Orleans and running up the Mississippi
River to Memphis, the tip of your finger would pass through
the very birthplace of rock and roll—a region where nearly
every step in its early development took place and where
nearly every significant contributor to that development was
born. But if the foundation of rock and roll was mostly laid
down within 100 miles of the Mississippi River in the mid-
1950s, the blueprint for what would follow required the further contributions of a young man born 700 miles to the west on
this day in 1936: Charles Harden Holley. Writing and performing
under the name Buddy Holly, this Lubbock, Texas, native would
have an influence on rock and roll that would far outlast his
tragically shortened career.