A Day in the Life
Updated: Jun 15, 2023
You don't have to be a hard-core Beatles fan to see their sites in Liverpool. But it might just turn you into one.
I’ve never considered myself a hard-core Beatles fan. Oh, I like their music. I’m very familiar with the whole “Fab Four”, Ed Sullivan Show, Paul Is Dead, Yoko Broke Up The Band stuff. I’ve watched the recent documentaries (McCartney 3,2,1 and The Beatles: Get Back). And, having been a music radio personality for more than 30 years, I’ve played more than my share of Beatles songs along the way. But hard-core? No. I never felt the need to go out of my way to find Beatles memorabilia or famous Beatles landmarks. However, when you’re in England already, getting yourself to Liverpool isn’t really that much “out of the way”. And that was the case in 2019 when Ann and I were planning a trip to Europe. We’d be starting in London then swing over to Wales. Liverpool was practically in the neighborhood. Knowing that we’d have a day or so in the Fab Four’s hometown, it didn’t take much to do a little pre-planning via Google to find the locations of the must-see Beatles spots: Paul and John’s boyhood homes, Strawberry Field, The Cavern Club, Penny Lane, and whatever else we might stumble upon.
Strawberry Fields Forever
Let me take you down 'cause I'm going to Strawberry Fields. - John Lennon, 1967
The day came and armed with our rental car, GPS, our Google notes, and a city map, we set out for a day in the life of a Beatles fan in Liverpool. First stop, the house where Paul McCartney grew up.
The unit, part of a long set of row houses, is tucked away on a quiet side street in a neighborhood southeast of downtown Liverpool. McCartney lived here from 1955 to 1963. On this particular day, the only sign of other Beatles fans was a Fab Four Taxi Tour car rolling by. The McCartney home is listed on the UK’s National Trust and tour tickets to get you inside the residence can be purchased ahead of time. We chose to stick with our self-guided tour.
John Lennon’s childhood home is less than a mile from Paul’s, as the crow flies (or is that, as the Blackbird flies?), and is a little more upscale than the modest McCartney dwelling. John lived in the well-appointed two-story house with his aunt Mimi from 1946 to ’63 and, like Paul’s, it’s also part of the National Trust. From John’s bedroom window here, he could see the Salvation Army’s orphanage nearby, known as Strawberry Field, the inspiration for the Beatles 1966 hit song. Lennon would often play in the garden area behind the Strawberry Field building.
We made our way to the famous red gates at the entrance to the Strawberry Field property. The original orphanage house was demolished in 1973 and has since been replaced with a new Strawberry Field Exhibit, featuring Beatles history, memorabilia, a café, and information about the Salvation Army. All sales at the Strawberry Field Exhibit fund programs that provide employment skills and work opportunities for people with learning disabilities throughout the Liverpool area.
Eleanor Rigby
Eleanor Rigby, died in the church and was buried along with her name. Nobody came. – Paul McCartney, 1966
As the story goes, Paul and John first met when Paul went to an event being held at St. Peter’s Woolton Parish Church in Liverpool where John’s band, The Quarrymen, was playing. That
church, just a stone’s throw from Strawberry Field and John’s Aunt Mimi’s house, would be the next stop on our Liverpool Beatles Tour. But not because it was the “birthplace of The Beatles”, but because there’s a grave there that draws Beatles fans from far and wide. McCartney maintains that he chose the name Eleanor Rigby for the song by combining “Eleanor”, from actress Eleanor Bron who was in the Beatles’ film “Help!”, with “Rigby”, a store (Rigby & Evens) in Bristol, England. But perhaps there was a more subliminal inspiration.
In the St. Peter’s Church graveyard is a headstone for the Rigby family: John d. 1915, Doris d. 1927, Frances d. 1928, and…yes…Eleanor Rigby, died Oct. 10, 1939. We’ll never know if this Eleanor Rigby picked up the rice in St. Peter’s Church where weddings had been. But she was most definitely buried here. And everyone comes.
Penny Lane
Penny Lane, there is a barber showing photographs of every head he’s had the pleasure to know. – Paul McCartney, 1967
The whole of Penny Lane in southeast Liverpool is less than a half-mile long. But that short stretch of road holds an outsized place in music history. From Simon & Garfunkel’s “59th Street Bridge Song” to Gerry Rafferty’s “Baker Street”, no song about an actual thoroughfare captures the simple slice-of-life goings on like “Penny Lane”, the 1967 flipside of “Strawberry Fields Forever”. Penny Lane road signs dot the sidewalk along the half-mile stretch, most of them covered in graffiti left by tourists and Beatles fans. One even has a signature from Paul McCartney himself. More on that in a moment.
As we made our way from one end of Penny Lane to the other, we reached the ‘shelter in the middle of the roundabout.’ From there, we didn’t see the banker with a motorcar, the fireman with an hourglass, or the nurse selling poppies from a tray. But we did see the Penny Lane Barber Shop (now known as Tony Slavin Ladies & Gentlemens Salon). The barber who was showing the photographs back in the 50’s – when Paul and John weren’t yet letting their hair grow out to “mop tops” – is long gone. And the photographs of regular customers have been replaced by pictures of the Fab Four visiting the shop after they’d become famous. The barber during our visit was Adele Allan, owner of the Penny Lane Barber Shop since 2007. I had purposely skipped my last trim in the States so I could get a haircut here and Adele was more than happy to oblige.
During my cut, we mentioned to Adele that we had watched the episode of James Corden’s “Carpool Karaoke” that featured Corden and Paul McCartney tooling around Liverpool (with Paul leaving his signature on one of the Penny Lane road signs) and making a stop here in the Penny Lane Barber Shop the previous year. Sadly, that was a bit of a sore subject for Adele. She explained that she had worked the shop nearly every Saturday for decades. But that particular week she had chosen to take a vacation to Norway, missing out on her opportunity to meet one of the two living Beatles. To this day, Adele has never met any of the Beatles in person, despite maintaining the legacy of one of the most beloved real-life locations in Beatles lore. (Adele retired from the Penny Lane Barber Shop in December 2022.)
After the trim, you can sit in the barber chair and get your picture taken holding a Penny Lane road sign. (Maybe Adele will show the picture to future customers, letting them know she had the pleasure of knowing my head.) She invited us to come back to the shop later that afternoon because the original red gates of Strawberry Field had been refurbished and were going to be pulled on a trailer past various Beatles-related locations, before being reinstalled at the new Strawberry Field Exhibit. (So, the gates we saw earlier, and took pictures of, were just replica placeholders. Hmmm.) We made a mental note to try to get back to the shop later. But for now, it’s on with our tour: downtown to the Cavern Club!
In My Life
There are places I remember all my life, though some have changed. – John Lennon, 1965
If The Beatles were “born” at St. Peter’s Church where John and Paul met, the band came of age at the Cavern Club on Mathew St. in downtown Liverpool. It was at the Cavern Club that the Fab Four (then with Pete Best on drums) were discovered by future manager Brian Epstein. We found the underground club surprisingly busy for a Tuesday afternoon, with a standing-room-only crowd listening to live performers on both stages and people crowded near the bars and souvenir counters. Ann scored some sweet Lennon-esque round sunglasses.
The Cavern Club has seen quite a few structural changes since The Beatles last played here in 1963, including briefly moving from its original location at 10 Mathew St. to 7 Mathew, just across the street.
Now back at 10 Mathew St., the club in its current form still features low ceilings, brick walls and archways, and occupies about 70% of the club’s original footprint.
Oh, and speaking of originals and refurbishings, remember Adele at the Penny Lane Barber Shop mentioning how they were going to be pulling the repaired Strawberry Field gates through town? Sure enough, we happened to be outside when they pulled the gates right through downtown. We didn’t have to go back to the barber shop after all.
The End
And in the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make. – Paul McCartney, 1969
A visit to the boyhood homes of Paul McCartney and John Lennon. Enjoying live music in the Cavern Club. Getting a haircut at the Penny Lane Barber Shop (my personal highlight). A swing by Strawberry Field. Catching a glimpse of Eleanor Rigby’s final resting place (even if it may not have been THE Eleanor Rigby). We didn’t start the day as “hard-core” Beatles fans, but we’re a little closer to that now.
The sights and sounds and memories of our self-guided Beatles Tour of Liverpool will be with us forever. We loved it! To paraphrase Sir Paul, ‘Liverpool is in my ears and in my eyes. There beneath the blue suburban skies.’
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