Otis Redding - Warning! Dead Pic!

[HappyCat]

I found the december 1967 Jet magazine article on Googlebooks. There is a picture of a frozen Otis Redding at the morgue, still strapped to his seat.
http://books.google.ca/books?id=S7gD...201967&f=false

Wow, thanks for that link. Very interesting picture and article. I am so curious as to those final seconds before impact. Was Otis awake and aware what was going to happen? The way he is seated, with his feet still crossed, makes it look like he was asleep and didn't move at all before they crashed.

[Buttercup]

That is facinating but it is tough to reconcile it with the other picture of the body being pulled out. It doesn't look like it is in a seat but I am sure it is just the camera angle.
Thanks for posting it.
Regards,
Mary

I honestly didn't know he was still in his seat with the first picture. You really can't see it. But that second picture was a real surprise to me. I looked at the first picture again, and with the shadows and possibly his jacket is probably covering his seat belt. I think the pulley was hooked up to the back of the seat to pull Otis up.

[Aries65]

I honestly didn't know he was still in his seat with the first picture. You really can't see it. But that second picture was a real surprise to me. I looked at the first picture again, and with the shadows and possibly his jacket is probably covering his seat belt. I think the pulley was hooked up to the back of the seat to pull Otis up.

I didn't either. Pretty cool to see that pic of him frozen in the cockpit chair. Who knew JET magazine was so death-haggish!

[Buttercup]

I didn't either. Pretty cool to see that pic of him frozen in the cockpit chair. Who knew JET magazine was so death-haggish!

I know! And that picture was in the 1967 issue. JET was way ahead of their time!

[KCBee]

Wow...cool article. Reading the rest of the magazine really takes you back to the racial turmoil of the 60's. Fascinating information. I was born in the 80's and have only heard about the drama of the sixties. What a decade!

[unihikid]

see jet and ebony magazine was the only national news magazine for blacks,therefore they wrote some good in depth articles,i asked my mom about the ebony magazine with the sam cooke article(its like 6 full lenght huge pages),and she said that when sam and otis died the only thing mentioned in the local news paper was a small article.

[STsFirstmate]

I honestly didn't know he was still in his seat with the first picture. You really can't see it. But that second picture was a real surprise to me. I looked at the first picture again, and with the shadows and possibly his jacket is probably covering his seat belt. I think the pulley was hooked up to the back of the seat to pull Otis up.

I think you are right. I took a careful look at both pictures and I think you just don't see the seat as he is being pulled up in the one photo but I suspect they left him in it since he was frozen..
Regards,
Mary

[Alanwench]

Oh, okay, thanks!!

The only way I know this is because the commercial came on when I was visiting my grandpa. He has the captioning thingy on his TV. It does sound like "Travel, travel, travel."

[DsplcdPrsn]

I honestly didn't know he was still in his seat with the first picture. You really can't see it. But that second picture was a real surprise to me. I looked at the first picture again, and with the shadows and possibly his jacket is probably covering his seat belt. I think the pulley was hooked up to the back of the seat to pull Otis up.

I also didn't know that he was in the chair. On the other hand, that morgue picture answers the question I always had about the picture of him being pulled out of the lake: what was the hook attached to? It always seemed insensitive if they hooked the body, and hooking the coat would have been ineffective. They hooked the seat!

[motherogod]

Great, great, GREAT information and articles!

[Kman0072]

From my own files:

[bulletnose]

For a death pic he looks rather peaceful. Usually victims of a plane crash have some sort of trauma and are disfigured, i.e. Buddy Holly,Ritchie Valens,J.P.Richardson and Scott Peterson crash. Hopefully,It was quick for Otis. The JFK,Jr. pic is a fake

[Shadyruss182]

I cant see his morgue picture. But when i saw the picture of him being pulled up i kept thinking just the angle and the position of him i couldnt put my finger on it but there was something. And him being in a chair makes perfect sense.

[ahafan02]

Maybe it's just me but the morgue pic clearly shows he has a major head wound (forehead) that is mysteriously absent in the pic of him being pulled out

[deanfan]

I was wondering about that also. You can make out cuts on his face when he is being taken out of the water, but the blood on the forehead is not there.

[Trilby]

Took me a while to build up courage to look in this thread. Massive Otis fan. He had such a soulful voice and could whip a crowd up like nobody.

Otis Blue is a great album.

I'm glad he looked peaceful in the pictures, like it was a quick end.

[TheThrone]

Can someone post a link of the photo, i cnt see the magazine on my ipod.

[stfunie]

I live 30 min from Lake Monona and am going with my little girl this Wednesday to walk around, see the plaque and pay respects to the king of soul. http://www.mononaterrace.com/

It's worth mentioning that the plane crashed into the lake in December.. in Wisconsin.. Probably kept him preserved for a while since he was basically packed in ice

RIP Otis.

[stfunie]

Took my little girl with me to Monona Terrace yesterday, about 34 miles from us. Otis could not have died in a more beautiful spot, at least On one side is the capitol building, and on the other is this gorgeous lake. It was cold out (already under 50 degrees) but sunny and beautiful. The plaque was hard to find and I was not expecting it to be on the ground, lol. I asked about 6 people and no one knew where it was, so I had to ask the staff of the Hilton below where the thing was. Here are a few pics.

[racingfan]

I was wondering about that also. You can make out cuts on his face when he is being taken out of the water, but the blood on the forehead is not there.

That's just weird...how did that cut get there?

I had never seen that morgue photo before...just the one of him being pulled from the lake. I don't think many magazines would get away with running a pic like that today!

[kim.sun]

Otis wasn't in the water as long as JFK, Jr. Also, Otis died here in winter, December to be exact. We in Madison, Wis., where Mr. Redding died, has it's fair share of vicious winters, and '67 was no exception. Plus, the natural barrier-free lake allows drifts to form in the slightest wind. But because the lake had frozen over, finding the crash site was not hindered in the way of JFK, Jr.'s Since there were no eye witnesses as to about where his plane went into the water, his plane would have left no evidence of crashing through an ice-covered lake. That is the most graphic photo I've seen of Otis being taken from the lake. Though I started working at Madison's afternoon newspaper in 1977, I recall seeing this photo in the newspaper's library, while researching one fact or another of Otis during my nearly 31-year tenure at Madison's afternoon newspaper.

[photobug]

That's just weird...how did that cut get there?

I had never seen that morgue photo before...just the one of him being pulled from the lake. I don't think many magazines would get away with running a pic like that today!

I think the cut was always there (or maybe in front but farther back behind his hairline) but, because he was FROZEN, it didn't begin to bleed again until his body started to thaw in the autopsy room. I think the cut bled until his blood got too cold to flow, and that the lake water washed it away. That's why the blood wasn't visible in the retrieval photos.

[Gabby]

bumping this cause those photos are fascinating!

[cindyt]

http://www.wimp.com/streetartists/

[tazzboy]

[Poo Bah MCGee]

The wing of his wrecked plane was on display in the Hard Rock, Las Vegas, for some time.

[TheDude]

It's fortunate they were able to recover him still in his seat and he was whole.

[Weaver45]

It's so weird how peaceful he looks. Like he was just asleep.