Since he didn't fear death, the fact that his own played out like a verse from a 1950s teen-tragedy tune might have pleased Joe Don Looney.
The rebellious football hero died in 1988 when his Harley spun out on a hairpin highway curve, not far from the remote southwest Texas town of Study Butte.
"I'll never forget him, the leader of the pack."
Not only had Looney, 45, died before his time, he'd lived before it too.
His defiant career ended in 1968, just as a cultural revolution was sweeping away the conventions he never learned to abide.