Hero bus driver Ed Ray, who saved kidnapped children in 1976, dies at 91
Source: NY Daily News
Ray became lifelong friends with many of the 26 children he saved before dying from complications of cirrhosis of the liver
FRESNO, Calif. -- The nation called Ed Ray a hero when he led a terrified group of children to safety after they were kidnapped aboard their school bus and held underground for ransom in the summer of 1976.
But the unassuming bus driver from a dusty farm town in Central California never saw himself that way, even after news of the infamous Chowchilla kidnapping grabbed headlines and inspired a TV movie.
As for the 26 children he saved, Ray became their lifelong friend until he died Thursday at 91 from complications of cirrhosis of the liver.
"I remember him making me feel safe," said Jodi Medrano, who was 10 when three men hijacked the school bus and stashed the group in a hot, stuffy storage van in a rock quarry.
Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/hero-bus-driver-ed-ray-saved-kidnapped-children-1976-dies-91-article-1.1081059#ixzz1vKiWxLEd
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Photo: http://assets.nydailynews.com/polopoly_fs/1.1081090.1337411504!/img/httpImage/image.jpg_gen/derivatives/landscape_635/image.jpg
Merced Sun Star via AP
Frank Edward Ray, seen in 1992, stands next to the school bus he was driving in 1976 when three men hijacked it, kidnapped him and 26 students and buried them underground in Chowchilla, Calif. Ray engineered an escape and led all the children to safety.
Photo: http://assets.nydailynews.com/polopoly_fs/1.1081092!/img/httpImage/image.jpg_gen/derivatives/landscape_635/image.jpg
Jim Palmer/AP
School bus driver Ed Ray is greeted on July 17, 1976 as he steps out of the Greyhound bus that returned him and the 26 school children home after their escape.
BlancheSplanchnik
(20,219 posts)Safe passage, Ed Ray
Voice for Peace
(13,141 posts)just reading about a good man, even apart from the history, somebody who "if you knew him, you loved him." That part got me.
Brickbat
(19,339 posts)Cooley Hurd
(26,877 posts)Cross gently... and with the light, Ed Ray.
etherealtruth
(22,165 posts)It was terrifying as a child .... I can't imagine what those children felt .... that man was a true hero!
sofa king
(10,857 posts)That fall the "hide under the desk to save yourself from the nuclear attack" drills were replaced by "what to do if you're kidnapped and held underground in a bus" exercises.
I still remember the ditto sheet with the cutaway diagram of the vehicle underground.
uppityperson
(115,681 posts)Blue_Tires
(55,445 posts)mahatmakanejeeves
(57,664 posts)but "Dirty Harry" came out several years earlier.
Dirty Harry
Scorpio kidnaps a school bus load of children and demands another ransom and a plane to leave the country. The mayor again insists on paying but Callahan instead pursues Scorpio without authorization, jumping onto the top of the bus from a railroad trestle. The killer flees into a nearby rock quarry, where he has a running gun battle with Callahan. Scorpio retreats until he takes a young boy sitting near a pond as a hostage.
BTW, if that picture is too creepy, please let me know, and I'll delete it. Either that or you can notify a mod. Thanks.
The movie is violent from end to end, but I really like Clint Eastwood. I have the film on tape. I ought to watch it again.
treestar
(82,383 posts)Wikipedia now says he was visited by some of the children he saved in the days before he died. Adults now, though, obviously.
sabrina 1
(62,325 posts)guappo1
(53 posts)When it comes to Ed Ray it is not big enough. Remembering back to that story and with children of my own all I could think about was this man his bravery, few of us could match
patricia92243
(12,605 posts)Mabus
(14,352 posts)The ordeal was dramatized in the 1993 ABC-TV movie They've Taken Our Children: The Chowchilla Kidnapping (shown in the UK as Vanished Without a Trace) starring Karl Malden . . .
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1976_Chowchilla_kidnapping#Media_coverage
patricia92243
(12,605 posts)lunatica
(53,410 posts)I was thinking about it recently. It was an amazing story. That was over 35 years ago.
madrchsod
(58,162 posts)i read somewhere that you will be rewarded for your deeds and mr ray received his reward for the rest of his life. thank you frank.
Hell Hath No Fury
(16,327 posts)I remember the whole thing vividly -- it was incredibly bizarre. Godspeed to a good man.