Graham's mother had been a passenger on Flight 629, and was traveling to Alaska to visit her daughter, Graham's half-sister. Minutes after the plane's departure from Denver, the DC-6B exploded and the flaming wreckage fell to earth over tracts of farmland and sugar beet fields near Longmont, Colorado. The flight had originated at New York City's LaGuardia Airport, making a stop in Chicago before continuing to Denver it then took off from Denver, Colorado's Stapleton Airfield, bound for Portland, Oregon, with continuing service to Seattle. United Airlines Flight 629 was using a Douglas DC-6B airliner (named 'Mainliner Denver') piloted by World War II veteran Lee Hall on the evening of November 1, 1955. Graham had insured the restaurant and collected on the property insurance following the explosion. In 1955, shortly before the aircraft bombing, King's restaurant was destroyed in a suspicious gas explosion, believed to have been deliberately caused by Graham. After their reunion, King and Graham had a poor relationship, and were often witnessed arguing.

The two remained estranged until 1954, when Graham was 22 years old, and Daisie King was running a successful restaurant. Using her inheritance from King's death, Daisie became a successful businesswoman, but despite her newfound wealth, Daisie did not collect Graham from the orphanage. In 1941, Daisie was married for the third time to Earl King, who died shortly after their marriage. Graham was born during the height of the Great Depression, and, in 1937, his father died from pneumonia, causing Daisie to send the young Jack to an orphanage due to their poverty. Nicknamed 'Jack,' Graham was Daisie's second child, as she already had a daughter from her first marriage. John Gilbert Graham was born on January 23, 1932, in Denver, Colorado, the child of Daisie Graham and her second husband.

Graham ambushed at airport