Beatles fan talks meeting Paul McCartney, why she's been to 41 shows
On the morning of July 18 when Indio resident Linda Harger logged on to buy tickets for Paul McCartney's Sept. 29 concert at Acrisure Arena, the number of people ahead of her in the queue was crushing.
"I have to be in that building," the superfan recalled thinking. "He's coming to town and there's no way I'm going to miss it."
All the seats she wanted were gone when Harger got to the front of the digital line, so she purchased resale tickets. Skipping the concert was not an option. The event is a meaningful next step in a lifelong relationship with the music of The Beatles — and especially McCartney.
So when did that relationship begin? The 73-year-old got teary when she described watching the Fab Four make their U.S. debut on "The Ed Sullivan Show" on Feb. 9, 1964.
"I just watched them and life changed," Harger said. "They were just so amazing. So amazing. You know, there's a lot of articles that I see now that said ... one of the things that made The Beatles so popular at that time was it came so close after the (President John F.) Kennedy assassination. And so I think it changed a lot of the attitude. It was something to be happy about. Something that was pleasant and fun."
Harger recalled that during the band's TV debut, a caption flashed on the screen under John Lennon that said, "Sorry, girls, he's married." That was OK, because out of the four Beatles, she had a particular favorite: McCartney.
"It was all over, Ricky Nelson was out the window," Harger said. "(McCartney) is so handsome, and when you're a 12-year-old girl, that's basically it. He's also a very talented musician, great family man, aware of what's going on in the world, and he's kind and generous. John always had an edge to him, Paul didn't have an edge and seemed like a nice guy."
Building a community of fellow fans
From that moment on, Harger immersed herself in Beatles culture. She clipped every Beatles article she could find in her hometown newspaper — the Butler Eagle in Butler, Pennsylvania — and filled scrapbooks with them. She also began writing letters to other fans through teen magazines. A lot of them. By the mid-1960s, she had 50 Beatles pen pals with whom she swapped stories, opinions and sometimes even memorabilia.
"They were like letters to the editor. Back then, they would print your whole name and address. There was an article someone wrote that said, 'The Monkees are better than The Beatles.' That drove me nuts and I wrote in saying 'No! That's not true!' I got a lot of pen pals that way. Another pen pal would say, 'You should write to this person.' They had these things called slam books, and you'd mail them around, and people would write their names in them. If you liked what they said, you'd write them a letter," Harger said.
Source: yahoo.com/Brian Blueskye, Palm Springs Desert Sun
