my name is steve and this is the original life and sad ending channel jim croche was born on january
10 1943 in philadelphia pennsylvania his parents were italian americans from sicily jim had musical
ability and started playing the accordion at age five and eventually taught himself to play guitar
crochet went to upper darby high school in the philly suburbs and graduated in 1960. jim
became more interested in music while attending villanova college he formed bands and performed
at fraternity parties coffee houses and other colleges around the area croce met his future wife
ingrid in 1963 at a folk music party he graduated from villanova university in 1965. crochet married
ingrid jacobson in 1966 in a jewish wedding crocie had converted to judaism since his wife was jewish
jim croce released his first album facets in 1966 with 500 copies pressed jim served in the army
national guard in new jersey that same year to avoid being drafted and sent to vietnam from the
1960s to the early 70s crochet performed with his wife as a duo they mostly performed songs by other
artists like gordon lightfoot arlo guthrie and joan baez but eventually began writing their own
songs in 1968 the crochets moved to new york city where they recorded their first album with capitol
records during the next two years they toured the college concert circuit promoting their album jim
and ingrid croche not having much success in the music business they returned to the pennsylvania
countryside settling in an old farmhouse jim played locally for 25 dollars a night which was
not enough money to live on so he had to take odd jobs such as driving trucks and construction work
he however continued to write songs often about the characters he would meet at the local bars and
truck stops the crochets returned to philadelphia and ingrid discovered she was pregnant jim decided
to make another serious attempt to make music his profession he sent a cassette of his new songs to
a friend and producer in new york city in the hope that he could get a record deal when their
son was born in september of 1971 ingrid became a stay-at-home mom while jim went on the road in
1972 crochet signed a three record contract with abc records releasing two albums you don't mess
around with jim and life and times the singles you don't mess around with jim operator and time
in a bottle all received airplay also that year the croche family moved to san diego california
crochet began appearing on television including appearances on american bandstand the tonight
show and the dick cavett show jim again toured the united states performing on college campuses
and at folk festivals even with all the success he wasn't doing well financially the record company
had fronted him the money to record and much of his earnings went to pay back the advance
in early 1973 crochet began a european tour where he received good reviews during the summer of that
year crochet made television appearances on the midnight special and the helen ready show
jim croce's biggest single bad bad leroy brown reached number one on the american charts in july
sadly on the night of thursday september 20th 1973 while on tour crouching all five others
on board were killed when their chartered plane crashed into a pecan tree during takeoff from the
nike tush regional airport in nachitos louisiana jim croce was only 30 years old an investigation
by the ntsb named the probable cause as pilot error the 57 year old charter pilot had made
a downwind takeoff into a black hole of severe darkness limiting his use of visual references
crochet was buried at haines salomon memorial park in fraser pennsylvania as is often the case
jim's untimely death brought his greatest success most of his big hit records were
released posthumously songs like i have to say i love you in a song time in a bottle and you don't
mess around with jim to name a few in 1990 crochet was inducted into the songwriters hall of fame
you will often still hear his music used in films and tv shows like django and chained
x-men days of future past and stranger things what was your
favorite jim crotche song please subscribe and hit that like button thanks for watching