Hero driver from 1976 Chowchilla, CA school bus kidnapping dies - story w/pics
AP PHOTOS: Hero driver in Calif bus kidnap dies
By The Associated Press
Friday, May 18, 2012
(05-18) 17:49 PDT , (AP) --
In 1976, three kidnappers hijacked a school bus full of children in the farm town of Chowchilla, Calif. The kidnappers forced the 26 students and the bus driver, Frank Edward "Ed" Ray, into a truck that was buried underground and demanded a $5 million ransom. As the kidnappers slept, Ray and two older students dug their way out, and helped everyone escape without injury.
The incident made Ray a hero. He died Thursday at age 91.
Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2012/05/18/national/a135636D13.DTL#ixzz1vHD7nIsj
FILE - In this July 17, 1976 file photo. members of the Alameda County Crime Lab and FBI are pictured working around the opening to the van where 26 Chowchilla school children and their bus driver were held captive at a rock quarry near Livermore, Calif. Ed Ray, the school bus driver hailed as a hero for helping 26 students escape after three men kidnapped the group and buried the entire bus underground in 1976 died on Thursday, May 17, 2012. He was 91.
Photo: Anonymous / AP
FILE - In this July 20, 1976 file photo, officials remove a truck buried at a rock quarry in Livermore, Calif., in which 26 Chowchilla school children and their bus driver, Ed Ray were held captive. Ray, the school bus driver hailed as a hero for helping 26 students escape after three men kidnapped the group and buried the entire bus underground in 1976 died on Thursday, May 17, 2012. He was 91.
Photo: James Palmer / AP
FILE - In this Friday, July 23, 1976 file photo, the inside of the van in which 26 Chowchilla, Calif., school children and their bus driver were held captive is seen in a Livermore, Calif., quarry . Photographers were not allowed inside the van, but were allowed to shoot pictures after the van doors were opened. Ed Ray, the school bus driver hailed as a hero for helping 26 students escape after three men kidnapped the group and buried the entire bus underground in 1976 died on Thursday, May 17, 2012. He was 91.
Photo: James Palmer / AP
FILE - In this July 17, 1976 file photo, school bus driver Ed Ray Jr. steps from the bus that returned him and 26 school children home to Chowchilla, Calif., after the were kidnapped by three men. Ray, the school bus driver hailed as a hero for helping 26 students escape after three men kidnapped the group and buried the entire bus underground in 1976 died on Thursday, May 17, 2012. He was 91.
Photo: Jim Palmer / AP
Ed Ray, bus driver in Chowchilla kidnapping, dies a hero
Ray helped free 26 students from infamous 1976 incident.
By Joshua Emerson Smith - Merced Sun-star
Thursday, May. 17, 2012 | 11:46 PM
In his final days, Frank Edward Ray was visited by many of the schoolchildren he helped save in the Chowchilla school bus kidnapping 35 years before.
Mr. Ray, who died Thursday morning at the age of 91 from complications of cirrhosis of the liver, helped free 26 students in the infamous 1976 incident in which brothers Richard and James Schoenfeld, and Frederick Woods kidnapped the group and buried them alive in a rock quarry in Livermore.
"I believe he will be remembered as a hero, someone who was concerned about the children of our community and the children of the buses that he drove," said Jacki Flanagan, Mr. Ray's friend and manager of the Chowchilla Chamber of Commerce. "I think he'll be remembered for a long, long time."
The kidnappers drove the victims around for roughly 11 hours before stopping at the Livermore quarry, where the 27 hostages were forced into a buried moving van.
more...
http://www.fresnobee.com/2012/05/17/2841396/bus-driver-in-chowchilla-kidnapping.html
= new reply since forum marked as read
families. They had lost money on a real estate deal and thought they would make up for the loss with ransom money ... "brillent" move. 
They are still cooling their heals in prison.
