9 Days Of Lennon; Day 8 Bed-Ins for Peace

In 1969 the Vietnam War was still strong and was effecting everyone world wide, even The Beatles. Also in March of that year John Lennon had wed his second wife Yoko Ono and started their eleven year marriage, up to the death of John in 1980.

To protest the war the Lennon's had decided to grow their hair long and stay in bed for a week and promote the peace message. The couple were married on March 20 after having failed to get married in Paris days before. Apple employee, Peter Brown, told the couple to go to Gibraltar, a British colony near Spain and were married there. The couple liked Gibraltar because it was quiet and British. They originally set out to get married on the car ferry heading to France and by the time they arrived in France they'd already be married, but people wouldn't allow it due to the law that you had to be a three week residence to get married in Germany and two weeks to be married in France.

"So we were in Paris and we were calling Peter Brown, and said, 'We want to get married. Where can we go?' And he called back and said, 'Gibraltar's the only place.' So - 'OK, let's go!' And we went there and it was beautiful. It's the Pillar of Hercules, and also symbolically they called it the End of the World at one period. There's some name besides Pillar of Hercules - but they thought the world outside was a mystery from there, so it was like the Gateway to the World. So we liked it in the symbolic sense, and the Rock foundation of our relationship."- John Lennon

This story later was placed in The Beatles song, "The Ballad of John and Yoko".

 Finally made the plane into Paris
Honeymooning down by the Seine
Peter Brown called to say
You can make it OK
You can get married in Gibraltar near Spain

 On their honeymoon the couple headed from Paris to Amsterdam and checked into the Hilton Hotel on March 25. Another line from "The Ballad of John and Yoko",

Drove from Paris to the Amsterdam Hilton
Talking in our beds for a week
The newspapers said, say what you doing in bed?
I said, were only trying to get us some peace

 John and Yoko were aware that their marriage would be covered by the press so they decided to take this opportunity to spread peace. The two spent a week in bed in the presidential suite, room 902. 

"The first bed-in was held in Amsterdam on our honeymoon. We sent out a card: 'Come to John and Yoke's honeymoon: a bed-in, Amsterdam Hotel.' You should have seen the faces on the reporters and the cameramen fighting their way through the door! Because whatever it is, is in people's minds - their minds were full of what they thought was going to happen. They fought their way in, and their faces dropped. There were we like two angels in bed, with flowers all around us, and peace and love on our heads. We were fully clothed; the bed was just an accessory. We were wearing pyjamas, but they don't look much different from day clothes - nothing showing."- John Lennon

 Reporters had thought that since the couple had released the "Two Virgins" album cover, featuring the two naked that any thing goes and two find the Lennon's having sex in bed. But to their surprise the two were fully clothed, sitting in bed with signs on the windows that read "Hair Peace" and "Bed Peace". This event was filmed in colour and produced by Peter Goessens featuring the couple talking, sleeping, waking up, reading the paper and things like that.

The room in the Hilton is now room number 702 and is marked as the John and Yoko Honeymoon Suite. Couples are now able to get married in the room in a civil ceremony. 

A few months later the couple found themselves back with long hair in the Queen Elizabeth Hotel in Montreal on May 26. Canada was not the ideal location for the bed-in, they wanted to promote peace in New York but couldn't because John was banned from the US on half of cannabis possession the previous year. The couple then had the idea for the Bahamas and stay at a hotel where Beatles new manager, Allen Klein's nephew had his honeymoon. But the hotel was awful with twin beds cemented to the floor and blocks of concrete between them. John then said to have the bed-in in Canada, it's the closest place to the United States.

During the Montreal stay they gave up to 150 interviews each day and then recorded one of the great songs in Lennon's career and probably the best song to spread the message of peace, "Give Peace A Chance". The song was recorded on June 1 in the hotel room with special guest like; Yoko's daughter, Kyoko; US black civil rights advocate, Dick Gregory; Quebec separatist, Jacques Larue-Langlous, Timothy Leary; Toronto Rabbi Abraham Feinberg; musician, Petula Clark; members of the Canadian Radha Krishna Temple; and Al Capp, and American cartoonist.

In the United States their bed-ins were reported on 350 radio stations where they spread the peace message and the protests against the Vietnam War.

9 Days Of Lennon: Day 7 John meeting Yoko Ono

 "It is very difficult for us to know we love somebody because it is an insecure position to be in. But in the end, it is important to be honest about your love because life is not that long."- Yoko Ono

We all know Yoko Ono, the avant- garde artist who stole
John's heart in the mid 60s and would later become an inspiration to his songs like "oh, Yoko!", "Dear Yoko" and others. She would also be the one who would have John's second child, Sean and who he would marry in 1969. Many people blame Yoko for The Beatles break up, which in my opinion isn't completely true. She took part in many events like the Bed In's for Peace and even had a band named after her, The Plastic Ono Band. Yoko Ono had made a profound impact in John Lennon's life and here's the story of how they met. 

Yoko Ono was born on February 18,1933 in Tokyo, she was an only child and lived with her mother, Isoko Yasuda, who was granddaughter to Zenijiro Yasuda, founder of Yasuda Bank. She didn't meet her father, Eisuke Ono, who was a decedent of the 9th century Emperor of Japan, till she was two years old in California. She shortly headed back to Japan before World War II and survived the bombing over Tokyo in 1945. Yoko went to the same school as Emperor Hirohito's sons, although the girls and boys were separated she and Emperor Hirohito's son, Yoshi would visit each other.

In the early 50s the Ono's moved to New York and Yoko attended Sarah Lawrence College studying and singing music where she might a Julliard student, Toshi Ichiyanagi and would later marry him. The two moved to Manhattan where Yoko found herself becoming interested in the arts from inspirations like Fraz Kafka, Vincent Van Gogh, and Arnold Schonberg. During these times she worked as a waitress, apartment manager, and a music teacher in public schools in New York. Her parents didn't say much but Yoko always knew they were disappointed.

"It was all right for me to be an artist or a musician, but they were thinking of a more conservative route."

In 1962 she separated Toshi and moved back to Japan with her parents, there she found herself clinical depressed and was put into a mental hospital. Once released she married an art promoter from the United States, Tony Cox. She later had a child with Tony Cox, named Kyoko. In 1964 Tony had left Japan and headed back to New York where Yoko and Kyoko would follow. Tony had became Yoko's art assistant during their marriage. The two stayed married up until Tony had found out that Yoko had been seeing the great John Lennon.

During late October or  early November of 1966 John Lennon was talking to John Dunbar, an owner of an art gallery in London. Dunbar told John that there was some Japanese women who was having an art show at his gallery and was going to literally  be in a black bag. When Lennon heard this he thought it was some crazy sex thing and went to the gallery on November 9 just to see what it was all about. To his surprise there was no woman in the black bag, she was just walking around the gallery fixing little pieces of art. When John first saw Yoko and her work he dismissed her as a "crazy artist". He saw a fresh apple just sitting there that was priced for £200 and a bag of nails priced for £100.

"I thought this was a con; what the hell is this," John told BBC interviewer Andy Peebles.

Approaching John, Yoko handed him a card that just said "Breathe". John was then distracted by a ladder and a canvas on the wall. He climbed the ladder up to the top where in fine print the canvas just read "YES". 

"You're on the ladder -- you feel like a fool, you could fall any minute -- and you look through and it just says "YES". Well,  All the so- called avant - garde art at the time, and everything that was supposedly interesting was all negative; the smash-the-piano-with-a-hammer, break-the-sculpture, boring, negative crap. It was all anti-, anti-, anti-, anti-art. Anti- establishment. And just that "YES" made me stay in a gallery full of apples and nails, instead of just walking out. Saying, 'I'm not gonna by any of this crap."- John Lennnon

After he stepped down from the ladder he headed to a board with a chain and a hammer at the end. Underneath the board was a bag of nails and John asked if he could nail one in, Ono replied no. Dunbar was the one who told Yoko that that's not the way you treat  a Beatle. Yoko told John that he can nail one for 5 shillings. John looked at her and told her he'd pay her an imaginary shilling for an imaginary nail and there he hammered his imaginary nail. 

"And that's when we really met. That's when we locked eyes and she got it and I got it, and that was it."

9 Days Of Lennon: Day 6 "Bigger Than Jesus"

"How Does a Beatle Live? John Lennon Lives Like This" 

On March 4, 1966 London Evening Standard newspaper printed an interview with John Lennon written by Maureen Cleave, a good friend of The Beatles. The article describes The Beatles and their fame with meeting the Queen of England, Beatlemania, their relationships with each other and wives, and little things like that. A section of the paper is as followed;

"Experience has sown few seeds of doubt in him: not that his mind is closed, but it's closed round whatever he believes at the time. 'Christianity will go,' he said. 'It will vanish and shrink. I needn't argue about that; I'm right and I will be proved right. We're more popular than Jesus now; I don't know which will go first - rock 'n' roll or Christianity. Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. It's them twisting it that ruins it for me.' He is reading extensively about religion."

 Four months after the article was printed in England it had reached the United States when it was printed in Datebook Magazine on July 29,1966. Responses were horrid and Alabama disc jockeys, Doug Layton and Tommy Charles of WAQY had the idea of "Beatles boycott" and for everyone to gather their Beatles and Lennon merchandise and burn them. This started The Beatles burnings, the first burning took place on August 1, 1966.

The Beatles suffered from his comments with the burning, radios not playing their music, even death threats. While playing in Memphis a fire cracker was thrown on stage and exploded, the group  turned in concern to look at each other to see who was shot. Although their was much hate towards The Beatles at this time they had found an uncommon supporter, Rt. Rev. Kenneth Maguire who said,

"I wouldn't be surprised if The Beatles actually were more popular than Jesus. In the only popularity poll in Jesus's time, he came out second best to Barabbas."

Five days later on August 6 John Lennon and manager Brian Epstein apologized during a press conference, Brian stating,

“The quote which John Lennon made to a London columnist nearly three months ago has been quoted and misrepresented entirely out of context... Lennon didn't mean to boast about the Beatles' fame. He meant to point out that The Beatles' effect appeared to be a more immediate one upon, certainly, the younger generation. John is deeply concerned and regrets that people with certain religious beliefs should have been offended in any way what soever" 

John went on to say,

"I'm not anti-Christ or anti-religious or anti-God. I'm not saying we're better or greater, or comparing us with Jesus Christ as a person, or God as a thing or whatever it is. I just said what I said and was wrong, or was taken wrong, and now it's all this." He continued, "If I'd have said television is more popular than Jesus, I might have got away with it. In reference to England, we meant more to kids than Jesus did, or religion at the time. I wasn't knocking it or putting it down. I was just saying it as a fact and it's true for England than here."

Despite all that happened, The Beatles recovered and had gone on for four more years as a beloved group and onto their solo careers. In 2008 the Vatican had publicly announced that they forgive John Lennon's remarks stating that it was just a "boast" of a young man grappling with sudden fame.

John: "If I had said television is more popular than Jesus, I might have got away with it, but I just happened to be talking to a friend and I used the words "Beatles" as a remote thing, not as what I think - as Beatles, as those other Beatles like other people see us. I just said "they" are having more influence on kids and things than anything else, including Jesus. But I said it in that way which is the wrong way."

Reporter: "Some teenagers have repeated your statements - "I like the Beatles more than Jesus Christ." What do you think about that?"

John: "Well, originally I pointed out that fact in reference to England. That we meant more to kids than Jesus did, or religion at that time. I wasn't knocking it or putting it down. I was just saying it as a fact and it's true more for England than here. I'm not saying that we're better or greater, or comparing us with Jesus Christ as a person or God as a thing or whatever it is. I just said what I said and it was wrong. Or it was taken wrong. And now it's all this."

Reporter: "But are you prepared to apologize?"

John (thinking that he had just apologized, because he did): "I wasn't saying whatever they're saying I was saying. I'm sorry I said it really. I never meant it to be a lousy anti-religious thing. I apologize if that will make you happy. I still don't know quite what I've done. I've tried to tell you what I did do but if you want me to apologize, if that will make you happy, then OK, I'm sorry." 

9 Days Of Lennon: Day 5 Cynthia Powell

February 9, 1964 The Beatles appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show (read more here) as Paul sang "Till There Was You" as The Beatles were introduced by captions on the screen. As the camera approached John the caption read "John Lennon-Sorry Girls He's Married".

Cynthia Powell was born on September 10,1939 Blackpool to parents Charles Edwin Powell and Lillian Roby.She was the youngest of three with two older brothers, Anthony and Charles. In 1957 she met John Lennon in Lettering Class and was immediately drawn to him.

"I met Cynthia at art school. She was a right Hoylake runt. Dead snobby. We used to poke fun at her and mock her, me and Geoff Mohammed. 'Quiet Please,' we'd shout, 'No dirty jokes, It's Cynthia.' We had a class dance and I asked her to dance. Geoff had been having me on, saying, 'Cynthia likes you, you know.' As we danced I asked her to come to a party the next day. She said she couldn't. She was engaged." -

The two were totally opposite of each other, he was a teddy boy, loud and tough while she grew up in Hoylake, a well respected middle-class area, and was shy and well mannered. John began taking more notice of Cynthia when she grew her short, brown hair out long and dyed it blonde resembling Bridgette Bardot, who John loved. In the summer of 1958 the two attended a college party where John asked her to dance, he then asked her out where she replied, "I'm awfully sorry. I'm engaged to this fellow in Hoylake." and he responded, "I didn't ask you to marry me, did I?". That night John invited Cynthia and her friend to a pub where he and his friends would be. During the night John turned to Cynthia and told her that his friend, Stu Stutcliffe, had a place they could go. Later that evening John asked as she got on the bus home "What are you doing tomorrow, and the next day and the day after that?" and she shouted back "With You!". John and Cynthia had become almost conjoined at the hip and when they weren't together, like when John was in Hamburg they would send loads of letters to each other and when he came home with the money he had he would buy her clothing, like a leather jacket. The two dated for four years and were wed in 1962  at the Mount Pleasant Registry Office in Liverpool. Brian Epstein was best man and George Harrison, Paul McCartney, Cynthia's half brother and wife attended. John's Aunt Mimi didn't attend because she disproved of it. The two were married soon after the couple found out Cynthia was pregnant. The night of their wedding John preformed with The Beatles at Riverpark Ballroom.

Cynthia was kept hidden from fans during the early Beatles years because Brain feared that if the group might feel alienated with one married. John and Cynthia lived in Brain's flat at 36 Falkner Street for free where they lived with their child Julian who was born on April 8, 1963 and soon after would move in with John's aunt Mimi. Cynthia and Julian were kept out of the spotlight for all of their relationship. The couple later bought an apartment where they lived above Robert Freeman, who photographed The Beatles early album covers. Fans would soon cramp themselves in the apartment halls and place their chewing gum in between the lock of the door trying to catch John so they couple moved again into a huge home near Ringo.

She became close friends with Maureen Starkey, Ringo's wife, and George's wife, Pattie. In 1965 the Lennon's and Harrison's had taken their first LSD trip after their coffee was spiked at a party at their dentist home. John recalled the experience as fascinating, while Cynthia called it 'horrific".

"I lost John to drugs"- Cynthia Lennon

In 1966 and 1967 The Beatles had been introduced to LSD and had became interest in the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi  where she realized he was heading into the future while she stayed in her own. She was against LSD but took it twice more for John trying to save their marriage but realized that it was over. In 1966 John had met Yoko Ono in an Indica art gallery in London. He originally dismissed her as a "crazy artist" but Yoko often called and visited his home to talk to him. He began seeing more of Yoko and in during the White Album sessions he encouraged Cynthia to take a vacation in Greece. When she returned she found John and Yoko drinking tea and Yoko in Cynthia's bathrobe, John's response when seeing her was "oh, hi". Cynthia left the home and went to Pattie Harrison's sister, Jenny Boyd's home where Alexis Mardas, known as Magic Alex to the band was there.  Mardas got Cynthia drunk and tried to sleep with her. Later on Cynthia was taking a vacation with her mother when Alex appeared and told her that John was divorcing her on ground of Adultery.

"The mere fact that Magic Alex arrived in Italy in the middle of the night without any prior knowledge of where I was staying made me extremely suspicious. I was being coerced into making it easy for Lennon and Yoko to accuse me of doing something that would make them not look so bad."- Cynthia Lennon

The divorce of the two were official on November 8, 1968. Early in the year Paul McCartney had went to visit Cynthia and Julian, even though John didn't want him to. It was their he began to write "Hey Jude" a song trying to comfort Julian over this divorce. He appeared at the door with a red rose and jokingly said "How about it Cyn? How about you and me getting married now?".

Yoko wasn't the only one John had had an affair with while seeing Cynthia. Early years in the late 50s and early 60s John had also been seeing Patricia Inder. They met when she was 15 and John was 18 and had grown a friendship with the rest of the band. Patricia originally had a crush on Paul but he had a girl friend, Dot Rhone at the time. In 1960 her and John had finally started seeing each other, while John was still with Cynthia. Inder says that John had proposed to her but she thought he was joking so she didn't take the offer. In 1962 Paul had taken Patricia aside during a trip in Hamburg and told her that John had married Cynthia.

"It was a terrible shock. I was devastated. I bumped into him at the Cavern and he said we could carry on as before, but I didn't want to. I was heartbroken.' "- Patricia Inder

 The spent years apart after John and Cynthia got married and in 1965 ran into each other again.

"My friend and I had to fight our way through the crowd to the dressing room. And there was John. He was combing his hair, but when he saw me he dropped it and said: "It's the love of my life.'" -Patricia Inder

On the night of Lennon's death she recalls having a dream that there was a hole and someone was shouting "Help Me!" but she couldn't see the face of who it was. She later went on to have a son with the lead singer of Motorhead and is now single but still says she believes that the right guy is out there for her. 

"John spoilt it for me. He made me think all men were as romantic, funny and talented as him."- Patricia Inder

"It was said I never loved Cyn. That's far from the truth. We were young, bigheaded, and got into a physical relationship too soon. Perhaps if we took things slow we would have made it. I know we would have made it." - John Lennon 1974

Cynthia  has been remarried three times to Roberto Bassanini, who she divorced; John Twist, divorced; and Noel Charles who died in March 2013. In 1978 she released her autobiography, A Twist Of Lennon. Julian (now 50 years old) is a musician like his father.

9 Days of Lennon; Day 4 The Quarrymen

skif·fle  (skifel) n.:

Jazz, folk, or country music played by performers who use unconventional instruments, such as kazoos, washboards, or jugs, sometimes in combination with conventional instruments. (Definition from http://www.thefreedictionary.com/skiffle )

In 1956 John Lennon had started his own skiffle group with schoolmates, Rod Davis on banjo , Pete Shotton on washboard, Eric Griffiths playing lead guitar, Bill Smith on tea-chest bass and had himself as lead vocalist. They called them selves "The Blackjacks" but later changed to "The Quarrymen" after Quarry Bank grammar school where they attended and graduated in 1958. Not shortly after Bill Smith had left the band having Len Garry replace him and the band added Colin Hanton on drums. On July 6, 1957 young Paul McCartney had made an impression on John and was offered a place in the band (find more about John and Paul meeting here ). In 1958 The Quarrymen sat on top of a double Decker bus with a friend of McCartney's, George Harrison.

"I'd been invited to see them play several times by Paul but for some reason never got round to it before. I remember being very impressed with John's big thick sideboards and trendy teddyboy clothes. In a way, all that emotional rough stuff was simply a way for him to help separate the men from the boys, I think. I was never intimidated by him. Whenever he had a go at me I just gave him a little bit of his own right back."- George Harrison

The Quarrymen needed a stronger guitar player and Paul knew George from school and told John that he knew of a guy, little bit younger but good. On that bus it took some encouragement from Paul who nudged George to take out his guitar and play for them. George took out his guitar and played "Raunchy".

"Now George Came through Paul" (1980) "Paul introduced me to George and I had to make the decision whether to let George in. I listened to him playand said, 'Play "Raunchy".' I let him in and that was the three of us then, and the rest of the group was thrown out, practically." -John Lennon (1970)

The Quarrymen had their first recording on 1958 at  a studio owned by Percy F Phillips on 38 Kensington. They recorded Paul McCartney and George Harrison's song "In Spite of All The Danger" and Buddy Holly's "That'll Be The Day".

"It says on the label that it was me and George but I think it was actually written by me, and George played the guitar solo! We were mates and nobody was into copyrights and publishing, nobody understood - we actually used to think when we came down to London that songs belonged to everyone. I've said this a few times but it's true, we really thought they just were in the air, and that you couldn't actually own one. So you can imagine the publishers saw us coming! 'Welcome boys, sit down. That's what you think, is it?' So that's what we used to do in those days - and because George did the solo we figured that he 'wrote' the solo."- Paul McCartney

The record cost the band 17 shillings and three pence. There were only one record so the band would take turns, each week handing the record off until John "Duff Lowe" kept it for 23 years. The record featured George Harrison, Paul McCartney, John Lennon, Colin Hanton, and Duff Lowe who played piano.

The Quarrymen would later change to  Long John and The Silver Beetles, To The Silver Beetles, to The Beatles dropping members and adding members (like Stu Stutcliffe and Pete Best) until it became the Fab Four when Ringo joined in 1962.

Original band members like John Duff Lowe, Len Garry, Rod Davis, and Colin Hanton still preform as The Quarrymen, check them out here.

9 Days Of Lennon; Day 3 July 6,1957

GARDEN FETE
ST. PETER'S CHURCH FIELD
Saturday, 6TH July, 1957
at 3 p.m.
ADMISSION BY PROGRAMME:
CHILDREN 3d.
PROCEEDS IN AID OF CHURCH FUNDS

St. Peter's Church field was filled with event from crowning of the Rose Queen (Miss Sally Wright) at 3-00 p.m. to the Fancy Dress Parade to Musical Selections by the band of Cheshire (Earl of Chester) Yeomanry to the Skiffle Group, The Quarrymen. 

Young Paul McCartney

 John Lennon and his band named after his school, Quarry Bank, would play three sets that day, once at 4-15 p.m. again at 5-45 and once again at the 8-0 p.m. Grand dance in the Church Hall for children entertainment. Waking up that morning he would of never thought he was going to meet a little fifteen year old who would change his life forever.

Fifteen year old Paul McCartney, who really looked 12 or so with his chubby cheeks and big doed hazel eyes, was asked to go to the fete with his friend Ivan Vaughan. He accepted and attended the fete where he saw the usual things at these events and took notice to the band that was playing,

"We headed for the stage first, because as teenagers we were interested in music. There was a guy up on the platform with curly, blondish hair, wearing a checked shirt- singing a song that I loved: the Del-Vikings' "Come Go With Me". He didn't know the words, but it didn't matter because none of us knew the words either."-Paul McCartney

The Quarrymen July 6,1957

The lead singer described as the curly, blondish hair, wearing a checked shirt kid was playing his guitar with five strings, as if it was a banjo and he accompanied by a tea chest, drums, banjo, and his band he called The Quarrymen. McCartney was impressed when the singer didn't know the lyrics to the refrain which goes, ' Come little darlin', come and go with me, I love you darling.'. Instead he'd sing, 'Down, down, down to the penitentiary.' This singer was the sixteen year old, John Lennon. 

During the end of the night as the thunder rolled in The Quarrymen found themselves in the hall across from the church with their instruments drinking. Ivan, an also good friend of John Lennon's and bassist for The Quarrymen, took Paul in to meet the guys. He told John, "I think you two will get along." The two were introduced. At that moment Paul asked to see a guitar, he was given one but all of The Quarrymen guitars were strung for righty's, Paul was a lefty. No problem though, he just flipped the guitar upside down and played it somewhat backwards. He wailed through Eddie Cochran's "Twenty Flight Rock" and knew all of the words, which at that time was very good. Paul later went on to play more guitar and also a piano that was set up in the hall where he played numbers like Little Richards "Long Tall Sally" and "Tutti Frutti", he played "Whole Lotta Shakin' Goin' On" in C. 

"It was uncanny, he could play and sing in a way that none of us could, including John. He had such a confidence, he gave a performance. it was so natural. we couldn't get enough of it. It was a real eye opener"- Quarrymen guitarist, Eric Griffiths

"I half thought to myself, "he's as good as me.' Now I thought, If I take him on, what will happen? It went through my head that I'd have to keep him in line if I let him join (the band). But he was good, so he was worth having. He also looked like Elvis. I dug him."- John Lennon

John recalls that that night he asked Paul to join the band, Paul replied the next day. Paul remembers the experience of himself wearing a white sports jacket with silver threads and having his hair in a teddish style. He recalls the band drinking and John was a little 'afternoon pissed'. He remembers John breathing boozily on his shoulder and asked him to join the band.

Later on Paul would teach John the correct way to play guitar. He added a sixth string to John's guitar and had taught him the chords since John always would of played it like a banjo like his mom taught him. 

"Paul could play guitar, trumpet and piano. That doesn't mean to say he has a greater talent, but his musical education was better. I could only play the mouth organ and two chords on the guitar when we met.I tuned the guitar like a banjo, so my guitar only had five strings on it. (Paul taught me how to play properly -  but I had to learn the chords left-handed, because Paul is left-handed. So I learnt them upside down, and I'd go home and reverse them.) That's what I was doing - playing on stage with a group, playing a five-string guitar like a banjo- when he was brought around from the audience to meet me."- John Lennon

The two became un-sepreatable from that day to The Beatles. Sharing a bond like no other and connected with each other on levels that no one else could connect with them on, for example John lost his mother when he was 17 and Paul lost his when he was 14. Paul thinks that the fact that they both lost their moms when they were young had given them a closer relationship. The Lennon-McCartney partnership went on to inspire the world and to change life as we know it.

9 Days of Lennon; Day 2 Aunt Mimi and Uncle George

Day two of "9 Days Of Lennon" is dedicated to his Aunt Mimi and Uncle George who in 1944 up until late teen and early adult took care of John Lennon.

"The Guitar's all right for a hobby, John, but you'll never make a living at it."- Mimi Smith

Mimi Smith was born as Mary Elizabeth Stanley to George Ernest Stanley and Annie Millward on April 24, 1906. She was brought up with four younger sisters, Elizabeth, Harriet, Anne, and Julia who was the mother of our John Lennon. The Stanley's moved to 9 Newcastle Road, near Penny Lane and later home of Julia, Alfred, and John Lennon. In 1945 Mimi and Julia took the role of caretaker to their father after their mother had passed away.

In 1932 Mimi was working as a trainee nurse and as a private secretary for Ernest Vickers. Across the street lived George Smith, a milk man who delivered milk to the hospital. George and Mimi dated for seven years and were finally wed on September 15,1939.  The couple bought a home in Mendips, 251 Menlove Ave where John was later brought up and lived with Mimi and George (read more about how John came to live with his aunt and uncle here.)

George later passed on from a liver hemorrhage in 1955.

"We (Mimi's husband an I) got on fine. He was nice and kind. (When) he died, I didn't know how to be sad publicly - what you did or said - so I went upstairs. When my cousin arrived and she came upstairs as well. We both had hysterics. We just laughed and laughed. I felt very guitar afterward." -John Lennon (1967) 

 After his death Mimi was left to raise the 15 year old John Lennon which wasn't the easiest. John had became what was known as a "Teddy Boy", swearing, tough personality. Smoking, skipping school and had gained the reputation as a trouble maker.

"I was fairly tough at school, but I couldn't organise it so it seemed like I was tough. It used to get me into trouble. I used to dress tough like a Teddy boy, but if I went into the tough districts and came across other Teddy boys, I was in danger. At school it was easier because I could control it with my head so they thought I was tougher than I was. It was a game. I mean, we used to shoplift and all those things, but nothing really heavy. Liverpool's quiet a tough city. A lot of the real Teddy boys were actually in their early twenties. They were dockers. We were only fifteen, we were only kids - they had hatchets, belts, bicycle chains, and real weapons. We never really got into that, and if somebody came in front of us we ran, me and my gang." -John Lennon (1975)

 The home John grew up in on Menlove Avenue had inspired and were the start of were Paul McCartney, who he'd meet in 1957, would write their very early songs on the front, glass en-closed porch. The home is not too far from the Salvation Army house, Strawberry Field, which later inspired The Beatles hit, "Strawberry Fields Forever", which was released on their 1967 album Magical Mystery Tour. If Mimi didn't take in John he would of most likely would of gone to Strawberry Field and the lyrics containing all about his child hood. For example, "Living is easy with eyes closed, misunderstanding all you see" meaning the orphans seeing families walking by the orphanage and not understanding where their parents and family is. "Nothing to get hung about" penalties in the states at  were the electric chair but in England it was hanging, so the line "Let me take you down, Cause I'm going to Strawberry Fields" means trespassing into Strawberry Field and it's nothing to get hung about. He was always writing and Mimi would always find his poems and would throw them out. In his later writing when it got really emotional and deep in thought he'd use secret handwriting so Mimi couldn't read it

"She always wanted me to be a rugby type or a chemist. I was writing poetry and singing since she had me. All the time I used to fight and say, 'Look, I'm an artist, don't bug me with all this maths. Don't try and make me into a chemist or a vet., I can't do it.'
I used to say, 'Don't destroy my papers.' I'd come home when I was fourteen and she'd rooted all my things and thrown all my poetry out. I was saying, 'One day I'll be famous and you're going to regret it.'"- John Lennon (1972) 

In 1964, The Beatles went on their World Tour (read more here) and John arranged them to tour in New Zealand so Mimi could visit her sister, Harriet there. Mimi stayed in New Zealand for five months and in 1965 John purchased a house for Mimi due to fans constantly surrounding the house in Mendips and stealing whatever they could get their hands on.

The two always stayed close even when John moved to the states in 1971 with second wife, Yoko Ono, who Mimi was never a fan of. John never returned to England after moving to the United States but phones his aunt once a week, sometimes twice. She recalls her last time speaking to John, December 8, 1980. He told her, "I'll be seeing you soon, Mimi. I can't wait to see you."  the next morning as she watched the news she had seen her beloved nephew was shot and killed in New York by a deranged fan.

Mimi died December 6, 1991 at home in Dorset, England. She was being taken care of by a house nurse, Lynne Varcoe who was helping her to bed when she said her last words, "Hello, John."