AND IN THE BEGINNING . . .
John Winston Lennon
Born: Wednesday, 9 October 1940
James Paul McCartney
Born: Thursday, 18 June 1942
George Harrison
Born: Thursday, 25 February 1943
Richard Starkey (Ringo Starr)
Born: Sunday, 7 July 1940
RINGO STARR was the first Beatle born and the last member to join the group, so he can claim to be both the oldest and youngest of the Fab Four. He was born to Elsie and Richard Starkey in the Dingle, one of Liverpool’s roughest, most depressed areas, and just as he was born, the air raid sirens blared. At the time, there was no local shelter ready, so the family rushed into the coal hole to hide. According to Elsie, baby Ringo screamed all the way, and it wasn’t until she had settled in that she realised she had been carrying her newborn upside down. She calmed him down and he slept through the rest of the air raid.
Ringo was plagued by illness throughout his childhood, suffering from peritonitis aged six, which resulted in a year’s hospitalisation, including some time in a coma, and later, at thirteen, tuberculosis. This took two years to recover from, and he never returned to school.
His dad worked at a bakery and confectioners. He left the family when Ringo was only three years old. To keep house and home together Elsie took on work as a barmaid, working as many shifts as she could get. She later married Harry Graves, a painter and decorator from Romford, when Ringo was thirteen.
While no bombs were dropped on Liverpool the actual night JOHN LENNON was born, he too came into the world as the Luftwaffe were attacking the area. This probably accounts for John’s parents giving him the middle name of Winston, after Churchill, in a gesture of momentary patriotism.
Alfred Lennon and Julia Stanley first met in 1927 in Liverpool’s Sefton Park. He was dressed to impress the ladies – bowler-hatted and brandishing a cigarette holder – and when he spotted Julia, whom he’d seen before in a local dance hall, he decided to approach her. When Julia told him he looked silly, he told her she looked lovely and threw his hat into the pond. He was a cheeky, happy-go-lucky chancer, and she the rebellious, carefree daughter of a respectable family. Alfred was a waiter in the Merchant Navy, which meant he spent a lot of time away at sea, so they kept in touch through letters, meeting up when he was home on leave. Her family did not approve of the relationship. The couple married in 1938 on impulse, both returning to their respective family homes after the ceremony and their honeymoon at the cinema.
John Lennon as a young boy. Alamy
Baby John’s home life was less than stable in his early years, and when Alfred and Julia finally split when John was four years old, Julia’s big sister, Mary ‘Mimi’ Smith, was awarded custody. Mimi and her husband George, who had no children of their own, raised John. Sadly, George died when John was only fifteen. His mother Julia began visiting him again when he was in his early teens, and bought him his first guitar when he was sixteen. She was knocked over by a car and killed two years later, leaving John devastated.
PAUL McCARTNEY’s mum and dad settled down later than was usual at the time when they married in April 1941. Mary Mohin, thirty-two, had concentrated on her career as a nurse and midwife, and Jim McCartney, thirty-nine, was a cotton salesman and bandleader. When war broke out, Jim was deemed exempt from service due to a hearing impairment. Instead, he volunteered to be a home front fireman, which meant he was not present for Paul’s birth at Walton hospital.
Young Paul McCartney and his brother, Michael. Getty Images
Paul’s younger brother, Michael, was born in 1944, and though Mary now had two young children she carried on working. As Liverpool’s cotton industry fell on hard times she became the main breadwinner. The McCartney family moved around frequently during Paul’s childhood due to his mother’s job taking her to different areas of Liverpool. In 1956, when Paul was fourteen, Mary died after breast cancer surgery, leaving Jim to bring up his teenage boys.
GEORGE HARRISON had the least dramatic birth and early childhood of The Beatles. He was born the youngest of four children to shop assistant Louise and Harold Harrison. George’s father had started out in the Merchant Navy, lying about his age to be accepted, before becoming a bus driver. His mum was a music fan who used to sing at home, sometimes so loudly she rattled the windows, and his dad bought him his first guitar in 1956. His independent outlook started from a young age: he would happily go on errands, alone, for his family as a boy, and he insisted on walking to school himself when he started attending Dovedale Primary School.
