Behind Laura Bush's Car Crash
The former first lady's memoir is hitting bookstores. Ann Louise Bardach talked to her old neighbors about 17-year-old Laura’s grief-stricken seclusion and the breach with the family who lost a son.
A. L. Bardach
Updated Jul. 14, 2017
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https://www.thedailybeast.com/behind-laura-bushs-car-crash
'Driving her father’s brand new Chevy Impala on November 6, 1963, Laura Welch ran a stop sign on Farm Road 868 at 8:08 p.m. at 50 m.p.h., plowing into a Corvair sedan driven by Michael Dutton Douglas, the high school’s track and football star, and according to some, a former beau of hers. The impact of the collision hurled Douglas’ car some 50 feet off the road, instantly killing him. Laura and her passenger, schoolmate Judy Dykes, were both treated at the local hospital for their own bruises. It was there she learned that Douglas had died of a broken neck.'