John back at Mimi's... more photos!

Einstein said the more he learned the more he realised how much he didn't know, so that puts us all in good company.

I came across these photos recently. They were taken in 1966 and show John Lennon at Harbour's Edge, the waterside home he bought for his Aunt Mimi in Sandbanks the year before. Clearly the photos pre-date the iron railings John bought for Mimi so she could sit outside on that ledge and watch the birds.

With John are his half-sister Jackie, his cousin David Birch and Derek Layder, a family friend.

John with David Birch

David's mum Harriett was the youngest of the five Stanley sisters - Mary (Mimi), Elizabeth, Anne and John's mother Julia were the others. Years later John said the sisters were: "...five fantastic, strong, beautiful and intelligent women..."

After Julia's death in 1958, John lived with Mimi and his half sisters Jackie and Julia went to live with their Aunt Harriett, Uncle Norman and David, their cousin.

The photos suggest a close family unit and it seems John and David were in regular contact. 

A year or so later when David was living with Mimi at Sandbanks he visited John and Cynthia at home at Kenwood in Weybridge where Lennon gave him the 1963 Gretsch 6120 Chet Atkins Nashville model guitar he used on the Paperback Writer sessions.

According to the auction description when the guitar failed to meet its £400,000 reserve last year, David has asked John is he had a spare guitar he didn't want as he was planning to get a band together with some mates.

"I had my eye on a blue Fender Stratocaster that was lying in the studio but John suggested and gave me the Gretsch while we were talking," he said.

David also asked to borrow John's Mini Cooper and obtained the necessary cover note (below), which has since turned up in a collector's hands and (inevitably) on to teh internet.In 1991 David Birch was awarded the MBE for his services to the information technology industry. 

Whether or not he has since been moved to follow his famous cousin and return it for any reason is not known!

:: You might have noticed but we've been away for a while and there hasn't been a great deal of activity on the blog. Apologies for that. The plan is to resume whatever passed for normal service forthwith!

The book, Yeah Yeah Yeah: The Beatles & Bournemouth is still available at www.natula.co.uk. 

John Lennon - 'The most beautiful place I know'

It was the summer of 1965 when John Lennon decided to get his beloved Aunt Mimi out of Liverpool and away from the fans that besieged the home in Menlove Avenue where he had spent most of his childhood.

He spent £25,000 on Harbour's Edge, a six-bedroom waterside bungalow at 126 Panorama Road, right by the Sandbanks to Studland chain ferry. He called it 'the most beautiful place I know'.

The neighbours kept to themselves and there was no more intrusion on her life than Mimi wanted. Her move that September was reported in the local press, but the rest of the world didn't much care.

Earlier that year The Beatles had recorded songs such as Help! and Ticket To Ride, in which John appears to be confronting the reality of his fame. Perhaps he recognised Sandbanks as a place he could hide away?

He certainly visited as often as he could over the next couple of years.

And perhaps his relationship to the area is perfectly encapsulated by the terrific photo that features in Yeah Yeah Yeah: The Beatles & Bournemouth in which he appears with Mimi and his son Julian by the ferry, clutching the boy on one hand a bucket and spade in the other. He's glaring at a cameraman who's presence is unexplained, although it might be the local TV press that Mimi referred to in an interview not long after John's death in which she blames the ferryman for tipping off the press who interrupted a private visit.

Conversely, Cynthia Lennon recalls John cavorting on the beach in a sun hat, shorts and blouse, turning cart wheels and totally ignored by the wider world.

John's love of Sandbanks - and the photo from the book - inspired Dorset artist Stephen Bishop to create this painting, The Collector, in tribute.

'I painted the homage to John Lennon as I am a fan of his solo and Beatles work,' says Stephen. 'I love the Beatles and think they exemplify artists who are both creatively fantastic, experimental and successful. I love the way they developed in such a short space of time. They inspire me.

'Born in 1963 and enjoying family holidays in Purbeck (camping at Tom's Field in Langton Matravers) I have fond memories of taking the ferry at Sandbanks from the late 60s onwards. I adore the photo of John with Mimi and Julian.  

'I feel an emotional attachment to what it represents. It shows a proud father with his son and I find it touching as this relationship wasn't as full or constant as either would have liked it to be. In my painting, The Collector, I have also referenced images from earlier times in Dorset.  

'The figure sharpening a scythe replaces the photographer in the photo and for me is a intimation of what would happen to John in New York, a victim of his fame. The Collector is the title of a John Fowles novel that I like  and also refers to the toll that must be paid to cross on the ferry.'

More of Stephen's new work will be on show at the ARThouse Gallery in Bournemouth's Russell-Cotes Museum in August.

He'll also be exhibiting at L'Artishe Contemporary Art Gallery, Swanage from 21 September to 12 October.

:: Order Yeah Yeah Yeah: The Beatles & Bournemouth at a special price from here.

:: More about Stephen Bishop at www.stephenbishop.co.uk.

Tea and biscuits with Mimi

Above: Mimi at Harbour's Edge; and (below) in the lounge with John

Retired policeman Clive Garland was on duty the night Beatlemania gripped Bournemouth like a vice – 16 November 1963.

He was part of the squad detailed to escort The Beatles from Madeira Road police station to the Winter Gardens in a Black Maria police van.

Clive was simply doing his duty amid the mayhem that night - rubbing shoulders with hysterical teenagers and bewildered pop stars was all in a night’s work.

Events moved fast and as soon as the tidal wave of Beatlemania had broken on Bournemouth, the next morning it was gone.

However, Clive had not long joined the Bournemouth Borough Police Life Saving Team – and before long he was to again enter the orbit of The Beatles.

“We trained at Stokewood Road swimming baths every week and taught life saving in Schools throughout the Borough,” he remembers.

“We would train in the River Stour, at what was then Pontins holiday camp, and Bryanston School for competitions all over the south of England.

“On a couple of occasions in 1966 we were taken to Harbour’s Edge, the bungalow that John Lennon bought for his aunt Mimi in Panorama Road. We swam off the steps in Poole Harbour, which meant swimming constantly against the out-going tide, so as not to be washed out to sea.

“PC George Ferneyhough was our trainer. The team members included David Bradley, Bill Stevenson, Peter Owen, Tom Morgan, Richard Thomas, Charlie Case, John Howes and myself.

“Aunt Mimi would bring out tea and biscuits after we had finished.”

:: For the full story of The Beatles at the Winter Gardens in Bournemouth and more about how Aunt Mimi came to live by the sea at Sandbanks, see Yeah Yeah Yeah: The Beatles & Bournemouth. Copies available to order here at the special price of £14.95.

Aunt Mimi at Sandbanks

Those lovely folks over at the mine of Merseybeat information that is Liverpool Beat have kindly agreed to host an article about John Lennon's aunt Mimi and how she came to live by the sea.
Ever keen to oblige we've supplied an extract from Yeah Yeah Yeah: The Beatles & Bournemouth.
Read it here.
The photo was taken at Harbour's Edge, the home John bought for Mimi at Sandbanks, by press photographer Tom Hanley on assignment for the Daily Sketch at John's insistence in 1971 around the time he left for New York with Yoko.
Tom, who had been a confidant of The Beatles since finding himself holed up in a hotel room with them in Paris in 1964, visited Mimi with reporter Mike Hennessey.
"We spent the best part of a day with Mimi and found her to be very nice, very generous old lady, not at all how she has been portrayed since," remembers Tom.
The full story of Tom's day by the sea with Mimi is told in Yeah Yeah Yeah: The Beatles & Bournemouth, which can be ordered from the official website.
More of Tom's photos of The Beatles and others can be seen at tommyhanley.com.