you say you love me, and I hardly know your name ~

(I have a lot of vintage British newspaper articles, most of which are contained in scrapbooks put together by fans of the time so they’re not all that well preserved, but I thought some people might be interested in them so here’s one about George [also that article about the boys wearing the hair ribbon is pretty awesome]. You can click the image to make it bigger.)

Beatle George’s £20,000 ‘fortress’ by Don Short

Beatle guitarist George Harrison is pictured above at his “fortress.” It is his new secret home in the country, nestling behind a 14ft-high wall that completely shuts off the outside world of screaming fans. George has been living for two months in this £20,000 bungalow on a millionaire’s estate in the Surrey stockbroker belt. Few people know if his hideout. But yesterday I went behind the massive wall guarding the bungalow and terraced grounds covering almost an acre. I found George, the new squire, taking things easy. With him was his girl friend, 19-year-old model Pattie Boyd. George said: “I bought the place mainly as an investment and as somewhere to escape, just occasionally, from the fans - much as I love them.”

The bungalow is only seven miles from the Tudor style mansion which Beatle chum John Lennon bought the other day. By contrast, George’s home - pictured here by Mirror cameraman Alisdair Macdonald - is in ultra-modern style. It is of Australian design and L-shaped, with one section whitewashed and the other yellow-bricked. It has five bedrooms, two bathrooms, and three reception rooms. And, soon, a swimming pool. There is a gardener and a daily help. It is the kind of home one might like to buy for a bride. It could be lonely all on one’s own, I suggested to George. But the Beatle smiled and shook his head. “We have no plans to marry at all,” he said. “And lonely? Well, on the other side of that wall, I can be with millions of people within a short time.”

The Day John Lennon Died

19 August 1965. Ringo Starr reads a Beatles magazine in Houston, Texas.