Penelope Laingen, who united nation with yellow ribbons during Iran hostage crisis, dies at 89

[mahatmakanejeeves]

Last edited Sun Apr 18, 2021, 09:55 AM - Edit history (1)

I know; that's not what the song is about. I remember it.

I wasn't a big fan of the song "Tie a Yellow Ribbon Round the Ole Oak Tree," but it was a huge hit in 1973 when it came out. The meaning of the song was buried in the Iran hostage yellow ribbon thing.

Penelope Laingen, who united nation with yellow ribbons during Iran hostage crisis, dies at 89

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Obituaries

Penelope Laingen, who united nation with yellow ribbons during Iran hostage crisis, dies at 89

By Emily Langer
April 16, 2021 at 3:36 p.m. EDT

As the wife of a U.S. diplomat, Penelope Laingen had trekked to Pakistan, Afghanistan and Malta, loyally serving alongside her husband in the long tradition of Foreign Service families. {snip} Her most public ordeal began on Nov. 4, 1979, when Iranian militants stormed the U.S. Embassy in Tehran, where her husband, L. Bruce Laingen, was chargé ­d’affaires. Laingen — one of three hostages detained, separately from their embassy colleagues, at the Iranian Foreign Ministry — was the highest-ranking official among the 52 Americans held in captivity for 444 days.

That event, known as the Iran hostage crisis, led to the deaths of eight U.S. servicemen in an aborted rescue attempt and contributed to the defeat of President Jimmy Carter in the 1980 election. For Mrs. Laingen, as for other relatives of the hostages back in the United States, it was a personal trauma — a time of fear and worry, of missed birthdays and lonely holidays, and a period in their lives when, as Mrs. Laingen put it, “you couldn’t think about anything else.”

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To the American public, she was perhaps best known for the yellow ribbon she tied around the oak tree outside her home in Bethesda, Md., a symbol of devotion to the hostages that she displayed until her husband returned. The yellow ribbon soon proliferated across the United States and has endured in American culture as a sign of solidarity with deployed troops, among other causes.

Mrs. Laingen died April 3 in Marshall, Va., at the home of one of her three sons. She was 89 and had breast cancer, said her son Chip Laingen. Bruce Laingen, a former U.S. ambassador to Malta, died in 2019 at 96.

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Emily Langer
Emily Langer is a reporter on The Washington Post’s obituaries desk. She writes about extraordinary lives in national and international affairs, science and the arts, sports, culture, and beyond. She previously worked for the Outlook and Local Living sections. Follow https://twitter.com/emilylangerWP

Tie a Yellow Ribbon Round the Ole Oak Tree


Single by Dawn featuring Tony Orlando
from the album Tuneweaving

Released: February 19, 1973
Recorded: January 1973

"Tie a Yellow Ribbon Round the Ole Oak Tree" is a song recorded by Tony Orlando and Dawn. It was written by Irwin Levine and L. Russell Brown and produced by Hank Medress and Dave Appell, with Motown/Stax backing vocalist Telma Hopkins, Joyce Vincent Wilson and her sister Pamela Vincent on backing vocals. It was a worldwide hit for the group in 1973.

The single reached the top 10 in ten countries, in eight of which it topped the charts. It reached number one on both the US and UK charts for four weeks in April 1973, number one on the Australian charts for seven weeks from May to July 1973 and number one on the New Zealand charts for ten weeks from June to August 1973. It was the top-selling single in 1973 in both the US and UK.

In 2008, Billboard ranked the song as the 37th biggest song of all time in its issue celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Hot 100. For the 60th anniversary in 2018, the song still ranked in the top 50, at number 46.

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Tony Orlando & Dawn - "Tie a Yellow Ribbon" (1973)
3,254,220 views•May 24, 2013

RocknRollArchive2
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Rockin' The Palace. June 02, 1973. Performed at The Hollywood Palace on Vine St. just above Hollywood Boulevard.