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We got stories. Here’s one from recording the Tornado Jam II. You never know what will happen during a gig. And what shenanigans folks will attempt after.
https://bit.ly/48RhHLw

A photo captures the Cadillac that ended up in the lake during Tornado Jam II. But a closer look at the story behind the infamous “Cadillac in the lake” reveals something most people miss.

It wasn’t a Cadillac - at least not at first.
It was a Rolls-Royce. In fact, it was reportedly the only Rolls-Royce in Lubbock at the time. Borrowed to impress a girl - and it ended about how most of those plans do.

As Joe Ely explained in a 2002 interview with Chris Oglesby for Y’all Magazine:
“The second year, this guy brought his girlfriend to the Tornado Jam. They came out in the afternoon. Her daddy was a lawyer, Harley Huff, and he had
the only Rolls Royce in Lubbock. And this guy had borrowed that car from his girlfriend's daddy to drive it out there, you know, to look cool, so they could kinda' stud around.

And I remember this, Man! We were doing a sound check, late afternoon; I look over and here comes this Rolls. It parks over faced toward the creek, and the two people get out and start walking over to the stage. And I notice that car just roll just a tiny bit. I thought somebody else was in it; I couldn't see. It was pretty far from the stage, so I start kinda' walking over there 'cause I wanted to go over and see that car, anyway. And it started rolling a little faster and pretty soon I yell at those people; I said, ‘Is that your car?’ And they turn around, and by then it had started pickin' up speed.

They'd forgot to set the parking brake and that Rolls rolled into Buddy Holly River, or whatever it's called. I'll never forget this: I ran down to it - they were in a panic, just screaming, running down - I ran down to it, and I remember it went in head first and then it flipped over like a big bubble. It just flipped, and then it turned and just that angel on the hood was the only thing sticking out of the water. It was the most amazing sight.”

That’s the real origin story.
As for the well-known photo of the submerged Cadillac, that came later - and it wasn’t exactly organic.

Joe explains:
“And then the next year, Steve Moss, who was in charge of kinda' promoting & videotaping the thing, he just thought, well, ‘Let's kinda' set up a tradition,’ so he went and bought a Cadillac and just rolled it in the lake himself. So it was kind of a fake thing. The Cadillac was in the paper, the Rolls never was.

He thought well, this is a tradition so let's keep it going. I got a picture of the tow-truck pulling the Cadillac out. I've got my hand on the side of it like it was a big fish.”

So the moment everyone remembers - the Cadillac in the lake - was staged. The real story, the one with the Rolls-Royce quietly sinking nose-first into the water, never made the paper.

And you can imagine how the Lubbock City Council felt about the idea of a car ending up in the lake every year during Tornado Jam.

But officially, of course, the event was shut down to protect the beloved buffalo grass.

Nothing else to see there.

Courtesy of Flatland Sports Podcast
Photo courtesy of Steve Moss