James Dean, Elvis Presley & Marilyn Monroe the sex-symbol of 50s
Famous Photos of the 1950s - Famous Photographs of Rock n Roll Icons
February 3, 1959 : The day the music died.

It started out as an assignment and become a legacy. In 1955, the young Magnum photographer Dennis Stock accompanied the rising star James Dean in various locations in new York. The resulting photographs would prove to be the best and the most intimate portrait of this idol of the new youth. James Dean died a few months later in a car accident. On September 30, 1955 James Dean & his mechanic were driving his Porsche Spyder from Hollywood to a sports car race in Salinas when, late in the afternoon around Cholame, a young Cal-Poly student turned left in front of them on his way home to Fresno for the weekend. The crash crumpled the Porsche and instantly killing Dean, with the mechanic (who survived) being through out of the car.
In Hollywood, the suicide toll has been great. Avid James Dean fans still speculate that his fatal car accident was never an accident but a self destructive reaction to the pressures imposed by fame. Having become sullen after losing his lover Pier Angeli to Vic Damone. 
"Live fast, die young and have a good-looking corpse," said Dean who was dead within a month of predicting his own demise. Pier Angeli also never really adjusted to Hollywood or to the death of James Dean. A year later, Pier Angeli was found dead. Her suicide induced by a barbiturate overdose was blamed as she told an interviewer, "I am still in love with Jimmy" and then blamed Hollywood for the dead of their teen idol 

February 3, 1959 : The day the music died. On this day in 1959, rising American rock stars Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and J.P. "The Big Bopper" Richardson are killed when their chartered Beechcraft Bonanza plane crashes in Iowa a few minutes after takeoff from Mason City on a flight headed for Moorehead, Minnesota. Investigators blamed the crash on bad weather and pilot error. Holly and his band, the Crickets, had just scored a No. 1 hit with "That'll Be the Day."
"February made me shiver, with every paper I’d deliver" The lyrics of Don McLean’s 1971 hit American Pie refer to the plane crash that took the life of rock ‘n’ roll pioneer Buddy Holly, along with Ritchie Valens and Jay P. Richardson, better known as the Big Bopper. It really did seem like the day the music died. February 3, 1959 just after performing at the Surf  Club - Holly, Valence & the Big Bopper took off from Mason City airport in the middle of a snowstorm, bound for Moorhead, Minn. Their plane crashed in a cornfield five miles north of Clear Lake, killing them and their pilot.  On Saturday the 7th, Ritchie Valens' body was taken from the Noble Chapel Funeral Home in the San Fernando Valley, to San Fernando Mission Cemetery. His body was driven in a copper colored hearse. Buddy Holly was also buried on the 7th. Services were held in Lubbock, Texas, at the Tabernacle Baptist Church. Over a thousand mourners attended the service, but his widow did not. She later lost the baby. 

Elvis shocked his audience in a burst of high spirits rolling around on the stage with Nipper in a highly provocative manner during a fast and furious rendition of Hound Dog at the 1957 California Concert.  The LA Deputy Police Chief ordered the Vice Squad to instruct Elvis to eliminate any 'sexy overtones' from his performances or risk obscenity charges.  Even Colonel Parker took him to task. The Nipper Dog was given to Elvis Presley by RCA on the release of his hit Hound Dog.  Elvis kept the dog at Graceland for many years before he gave it as a gift to Paul Lickter. A British fan bought it for £3,000 in 1997. Elvis Pets

Still photographs from the 1955 Seven Year Itch starring Marilyn Monroe have since become synonymous with image of Monroe. Even Barbie Doll offered fans a facsimile. However, the photo on the left by photographer Bernard Brujo did not make the cut as director Billy Wilder was fearful of having his movie censored Photos 1960s
Anna Strasberg, widow of famed acting coach Lee Strasberg, inherited the bulk of the Marilyn Monroe Estate from her late husband. Two years ago, she sued two photo agencies for licensing images without her permission. Including, Sam Shaw who shot the iconic pictures of Monroe over a subway grate for The Seven Year Itch. Strasberg claimed that the images were part of Monroe's intellectual property and only her heirs should profit. In May, both a California and New York court ruled against her, claiming that the concept of a post-mortem right of publicity did not exist until 1984, so Monroe could not have bequeathed them at the time of her death. Dubbed The Dead Celebrities Act, grants posthumous rights for 70 years. That has made celebrities who died before 1984 fair game for licensing deals without the permission of their heirs. In early October, California passed a bill that effectively overrides the recent court decisions and grants posthumous publicity rights to celebrities who died pre-1984 to their heirs. It's still unclear what the net effect of the legislation will be on the disputed Monroe images. (In the UK, the High Court and Court of Appeals in 1997 ruled Elvis Presley and other famous dead celebrities as  public domain, meaning that even living stars do not own their own name and likeness) 

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