As dawn broke on Remembrance Day, an estimated 500 people stretched halfway down Bland’s Cliff in anticipation of the box office opening at the Futurist in Scarborough for the group’s December 11th concerts. Some had been queuing since 10.00pm the night before.
One teenager said, “We spent the night sleeping, chatting, playing records, and singing - Beatles’ hits of course. It was fun until the rain started.” Another added, “Watching the dawn come up - it looked very beautiful breaking over the sea. We’re going to enjoy queueing - it’s all part of the fun. Our parents think we’re mad, but they haven’t tried to prevent us. We’d do anything for the Beatles - they’re wonderful.”
Councillor Peter Jaconelli re-opened his snack bar at 7.00am (he had shut up shop at 2.00am), but by 8.00am torrential rain dampened all but the stout-hearted. Many of those who slept overnight were pushed to the back by the rush of people arriving soon after. The box office opened an hour early at 9.00am. Within half an hour, the queue reached the junction of Bland’s Cliff and Foreshore Road. By the end of the day, 3,500 tickets had been sold. Anyone who bought tickets for Bobby Rydell’s November 13th concert had been allowed to buy Beatles’ tickets a day early.
Three fans - Michael Ellis, Michael Hicks and Terence O’Toole - were arrested by P.C. Peter Nickson for breaking into Georgi Sulman, a nearby clock shop in Foreshore Road and stealing cigarette lighters and other articles worth £76. O’Toole took police to St. Mary’s churchyard where they had hidden most of the contraband. Appearing in court the next day, Ellis said, “We were sat in the queue and we got a bit cold, so we decided to get a cup of coffee. Then one of us decided to break into Sulman’s shop.” Ellis and Hicks were each fined £5, while O’Toole was remanded on bail to be dealt with by the juvenile court on the 26th.
The Sunday Mirror ran an article on the group by Kenneth Yates with a photo of the group glancing at the previous week’s paper. Commenting on their fans, they said, “Our fans are just plain, ordinary, nice people. We think they are fabulous, the greatest in the world. We don’t mind the kids screaming and shouting at all. They pay their money to get in, and if that’s the way they want it, why shouldn’t they shout? If we had wanted to do the same when we were their age, we would have been annoyed if anyone had stopped us.”
James Arnott writing in the Sunday Mercury commented on what he expected from the evening’s concert in Birmingham. “You could say I am going in a dispassionate spirit of sociological inquiry for a first-hand look at mass hysteria. Which is a long-winded way of wrapping up the fact that I am just plain curious about Beatlemania. I can take or leave the Beatles, and so far I have chosen to leave them. If I have heard their records it has been by accident, but I shall be there at Birmingham Hippodrome to-night out of vulgar curiosity, I haven’t been in at the makings of a good riot since I sat under the platform at the Town Hall several years ago and enjoyed the sight of Oswald Mosley in full rave while hecklers raised hell. It will be a miracle if the occasion goes off as inconspicuously as that today. I hope the Hippodrome’s glittering and expensively-rebuilt front escapes unscathed.”
At a Remembrance Day service in Prestwich, Canon Francis Paton-Williams told parishioners that it would be a tragedy if the tradition were to vanish. He went on to say that “If you do not worship God, you probably worship the Beatles, which is what thousands of these screaming girls are doing today. That is all part of worship - putting something on a pedestal and thinking there’s nothing like it in the world.”
Fans were also gathering at the Hippodrome, not for the evening’s concerts but just to see the group arrive. They had to wait awhile after the RAC was called and towed their car to a nearby garage after it had broken down on its way north on the M1. The group had a meal at the Newport Pagnell service area while the car was being repaired. They were then driven to Birmingham Police headquarters in Steelhouse Lane, arriving an hour late.
After having a nice cup of tea with the police officers and signing autographs for them, they borrowed police helmets and uniform raincoats and drove to the theatre in a Black Maria, with four constables as company, accompanied by decoy police cars. They entered the theatre by way of Thorp Street. George said later, “They put us in the Black Maria and told us to put helmets on. We didn’t really need them, but it was great fun. The police seemed to enjoy it as much as we did.” A police spokesman subsequently announced that “No arrangements were made for the Beatles to wear the helmets. The fact they they did so was purely a spontaneous gesture on their part as they stepped out of the van near the stage-door. Uniformed police had been with them in the van.”
In a subsequent letter to the Birmingham Daily Post, a reader mentioned that in 1901 David Lloyd George was disguised as a policeman to protect him from the wrath of his opponents at the Town Hall. John chatted briefly with P.C. Gordon Russell, whose helmet he had purloined. Apparently he wasn’t very complimentary about Marlene Dietrich. What he wasn’t aware of was the christening of his son John Charles Julian Lennon at Hoylake Parish Church in Trinity Road, Hoylake, Cheshire. Unlike John, twenty or so fans heard about it and sat in the back of the church during the ceremony and were said to be “very quiet.” Cynthia’s brother and his wife, her mother and her mother’s best friend Frances Reeves witnessed the Reverend Ifor Davies conduct the ceremony. Anticipating a large crowd, Hoylake police had sent two police constables and a duty sergeant to Trinity Road at 4.00pm. (The church would be demolished in 1976.)
Before the estimated crowd of 400 realised that the gates of the yard near stage the door were open, the Black Maria drove through with the gates immediately closing behind them. Police struggled to hold the fans back, with one of their number receiving an injury to his hand as he helped close the gates. A police officer said, “The ruse worked like a charm. We got them inside before the fans realised what was happening. The only trouble is that it’s the sort of scheme you can only get away with once.”
Earlier two girls had climbed a seven-foot wall into the yard but were intercepted by police and escorted out. Between the 5.30pm and 8.00pm shows, “The Royal Variety Performance” was broadcast on ATV and the BBC Light Programme at 7.35pm. Rather cheekily and not for the first time, the Teenbeat Club in Crosby promoted the group in the Corona Ballroom, not live onstage but on the club’s “fully amplified 23in. TV.”
Twenty policemen had to escort a man carrying their dinner into the building. During their performance both Paul and Ringo were hit by missiles thrown from the audience. Theatre orchestra musicians, electricians and members of a local Territorial Army unit helped stewards keep order.
At the end of the second show, the group left during the National Anthem, by which time only about 200 fans remained at the stage door. A number of girls were treated for hysteria and one youth put his foot through the roof of a nearby building.
In its review, the Birmingham Evening Mail & Despatch wrote, “They screamed and they shrieked and they stamped their feet. Whatever the decibel rating (and it must have been shattering), the audience were the ear-piercing victors when the Beatles appeared here last night... Entertainment? It all depends, of course, how you interpret it. But if the audience beat the Beatles with the sound barrier, the Merseysiders had the best view of the amazing spectacle. After all, they were four young men who were being paid handsomely to entertain two capacity audiences of 2,000 at each show, and they were able to watch the strange antics of the 4,000 who paid to see them. It was quite impossible to hear any announcement made by the group. On occasions, there was an appeal for silence, but the reaction was an even greater explosion of audience sound, hysterics and demonstrations. The stage was bombarded with far more than noise. Teddy bears, boxes of chocolates, photographs, programmes and sundry missiles were aimed at the performers. Then, with a sudden, stunning emphasis, down came the curtain - and the safety curtain. It was all over. By the time the National Anthem had been played the Beatles were out of the theatre and driving away from Birmingham. And within 10 minutes, the theatre that had rocked with noise was uncannily silent - and empty.”
In his review of the show the following Sunday, James Arnott wrote, “For one who finds his enjoyment chiefly at Stratford-Upon-Avon watching Shakespeare, or seeing an orthodox variety show, I found the Hippodrome a fascinating example of how the other half lives. At one stage, when a girl ran forward and started shaking the balcony rail as if she meant to tear it out, I wondered if perhaps the fans were going to start acting like lemmings and pour themselves over into the stalls as a dying tribute.
At another, I am quite convinced that the roof lifted obligingly to let out the noise when two of the Beatles waggled their haircuts in unison. I think, on reflection, I might have enjoyed the Beatles - if I could have heard them.”
Hippodrome manager Wilf May said, “Every credit must be given to the Birmingham police for the way they organised everything. Everything went smoothly. The audiences, in their own way, were good, too. They came in quietly, had a long scream and shout, and then went home.” Damage to the theatre? “The only trace was lipstick writing on some of the rough-cast.”
“My sister worked at the local hospital where they used to be given free tickets to the Town Hall, but the doctors didn’t want to go to see pop groups, so they used to be passed on to the staff. Marty Wilde, Georgie Fame, Gene Vincent, Eddie Cochran, Billy Fury - we saw them all. In the early ’60s the area was buzzing.
I was a dancer at the time and was part of Chipperfield’s Circus during their Christmas season at the Bingley Hall in Birmingham in 1960. I then joined the Lord George Sanger’s Circus and toured with them around England and Wales the following summer. There used to be a programme on the radio on Sunday mornings called ‘Family Favourites.’ The last song they played was always a pop song. I’d been banging on to my sisters and my Mum, ‘I love this song!’ ‘Listen to this song!’ and suddenly one Sunday, it came on, the last song played. I remember running down the stairs shouting at them. The song I wanted everyone to listen to was ‘Love Me Do.’
I kept a diary in 1963 which I still have, and there were many entries which mentioned the Beatles. I saw them three times that year. Firstly at the Town Hall with Roy Orbison, secondly at the Ritz in King’s Heath, and lastly at the Hippodrome. The first entry says - Monday, February 25th - ‘George Harrison’s birthday’; Thursday, April 11th - ‘Bought the Beatles record,’ which would have been ‘From Me To You,’ the first record of theirs I bought. My sister and I worked together at Gaskell and Chambers, and she was a couple of years older than me. We were going to buy the record together from Crane’s, the record store in Birmingham. You could listen to the records in a cubicle before buying, and all week she was saying, ‘Yes, I’ll pay half. We’ll buy it between us’ and when we got there, she said she’d changed her mind, and wanted to buy Frank Ifield instead! In the end she did go halves with me. She was faithful; Monday, April 15th - ‘The Beatles were on TV,’ and I put ‘gorgeous.’
Sunday, May 26th - ‘They played ‘Twist and Shout’ four times at the Atlas.’ The Atlas was a dance hall in Stechford in Birmingham. I used to go there a lot. I think it was attached to the back of the cinema, and was the place where I got my first marriage proposal; Tuesday, June 4th - ‘Saw the Beatles at the Town Hall, absolutely great, and all the rest, love them all.’ It was the Roy Orbison show. I don’t know where I got the tickets from. Probably my sister got them; Friday, June 28th - I put ‘Wish I was going to see the Beatles’; Saturday, June 29th - ‘Beatles on TV’; Thursday, July 4th - ‘Beatles on radio, going to see them tomorrow’; Friday, July 5th - ‘Went to Ritz saw Beatles, lovely. Met a boy from the platters also Redcaps (Smashing)’; the platters was some sort of industrial thing where he used to deliver stuff, and I used to see him when I was walking past the delivery area. He was at the show as well.
The only other group I remember was the Redcaps, although it was a dance as well. We danced before the Redcaps and the Beatles came on. That was the evening I met Dave, from the Redcaps, who I went out with for a while. He broke my heart that evening because he told me that John Lennon was married! I did love John for his non-conformist attitude, but Paul was so gorgeous looking, so I was torn between the two. John always had a draw towards him, but Paul was aaah, gorgeous.
My friend Sue and I met in Birmingham and when we were waiting for a bus to go to the show, this girl was there. We said we were going to see the Beatles at the Ritz, and she said, ‘Oh, are you a member?’ and we said, ‘No?’ She said we wouldn’t get in unless we were members or with someone who could sign us in. So she suggested as she and her friend were members, that if we waited in the queue, she’d go home and get her card, and get ready, and she would sign us in, so that is what we did. We got in because of the girl we met at the bus stop! I think I was 17 at the time.
This was the evening that I held onto Paul’s shoe. We went in, and it was a dance, but most people there were intent on seeing the Beatles, that’s why we were all there. I sat on the stage on the left-hand side, it was just a put-up job, just a foot or so higher than the dance floor. When the Beatles came on, Paul was standing right in front of me. I couldn’t believe my luck! It was a lovely show and I reached out to touch Paul’s foot, which he was tapping away as he did, and I just held it, and he looked at me, and he was smiling at me, and John was looking at him and smiling. I just kept holding his foot, I just loved it, it was lovely, such a thrill.
Wednesday, October 16th - I put ‘The Beatles on The Royal Command Performance.’ I don’t know why I wrote this, but I put, ‘Talked about Beatles tickets.’ Sunday, November 10th - I just put ‘The Beatles!’ It was the show at the Hippodrome in Birmingham. It is a theatre in the middle of town, which also shows pantomimes and ballet. It’s a big theatre. I can’t remember how we got the tickets. I know we didn’t camp out. I went with my friend Susan who lived next door to me. We used to go everywhere together and were Beatle fanatics. We just loved them. I was Susan Spears at that time, and she was Susan Spooner, and my Mum used to call us ‘Sis and Sas’ because our initials were the same. Everyone called us that.
That night we were in the balcony, and they seemed so far away. When we saw them at the Ritz, they were mine, it was like they belonged to me. I could sit on the stage, but when they were at the Hippodrome, they were big stars by then, and it wasn’t as intimate. Sue and I just wanted to listen to them, we were looking at each other and saying, ‘Why don’t they be quiet?’ and ‘I can’t hear them!’ We didn’t scream, we were just disappointed that we couldn’t hear anything. It was so different to the other shows we’d been to. I have to say out of all of them, the Ritz at King’s Heath was my favourite. The Hippodrome was in the centre of town and easy for us to get to. King’s Heath was out a bit and more difficult. Thank goodness we met the girls who were going and told us which buses to get.
Wednesday, November 12th - ‘Paul McCartney has the ’flu.’ The last entry that year relating to the Beatles is Sunday, November 17th - ‘I went to the West End to a dance,’ and I wrote, ‘Danced with a fab boy, Paul McCartney lookalike.’
I got married in 1966 and after I had the children, I didn’t keep up my diary. I didn’t go back to dancing because of the hours - I’m a family girl at heart, and all the jobs I did after I had the children were 9 to 5, because I wanted to be there for them. Love is what you’ve got around you. All these years later, I still get excited talking about seeing the Beatles! They were magical times.”
SUE FLANAGAN, WAITRESS, HALESOWEN, WEST MIDLANDS