From the Beatles to Sinatra, the Stones to Elvis, Daily Mirror showbiz legend Don Short knew them all. And he didn’t just write about them, he was also friends with many of the biggest celebrities in the world. (Excerpt from the Daily Mirror - To read the full article click here)
In the first part of our exclusive serialisation of his new memoir The Beatles and Beyond, Don recalls his time with the Fab Four on their rollercoaster ride through the 60s.
It was the night I was never going to forget. That momentous night April 9, 1970.
My world exclusive was splashed on the Daily Mirror’s front page: Paul Quits The Beatles.
Unimaginable drama was to unfold, and a world was left asking: “Where will we be without the Beatles?”
At the time I was the Mirror’s showbusiness columnist and as evening approached, I had just put on my coat and locked down my attache case when my office phone rang.
Instantly, I recognised the voice of one of my Beatles’ contacts. From the quiver in his tone, I knew he had something serious to impart.
Finally he stuttered: “Paul is quitting, Don. It’s definite. It’s all over. The Beatles are breaking up.
“Can you believe that?”
I slammed down the phone and called the home of a Beatles aide who was an executive of their Apple company.
There was some reluctance on his part to elaborate but, vitally, he confirmed the story.
In a bold typeface normally reserved for earthquakes, plane crashes and other disasters, the Mirror’s front page first edition broke the news: ‘Paul Is Quitting The Beatles’ and then in later editions: ‘Paul Quits The Beatles.’
It had been a long and incredible journey. Wearily, as I drove home, I had time to reflect on how it all began.
Things got social. Paul, George and Pattie [Boyd, George’s wife] came around to dinner one night at my home and it was a relaxed, fun-filled and off-the-record evening.
My six-year-old daughter Amanda couldn’t sleep so Paul settled her back in bed and sang a lullaby to her.
A few days later a disbelieving school headmistress telephoned and asked: “Can it be true as I hear from your daughter that some of The Beatles were with you earlier this week?” My wife confirmed the unbelievable.
“Oh,” said the headmistress “In that case could you please ask Paul McCartney to come and open our school fete on Saturday?”
When John and [first wife] Cynthia moved house to a mansion on the St George’s Hill estate in Weybridge, I arrived before the removal vans drew on to the drive.
John was unperturbed. He had become accustomed to my presence in odd places. “I knew that when I bought a new house I would find you in the kitchen,” he laughed.
While The Beatles’ best performances were for the public, I was lucky enough to witness their well-rehearsed routines in their dressing room.
The boys would tune their guitars and John and Paul, sometimes with George and Ringo, would decide on the running order of their hits.
My eyes often fell on road manager Neil Aspinall who, with a variety of pens, would sometimes be squat in the corner as he forged the band’s signatures on postcard photographs to be sent out to fans.
I have often wondered how many hundreds of forged autographs of the Fab Four are still in circulation in the global market. Even experts have failed to detect the difference.
John Lennon confessed to me that Neil’s version of his signature was pretty well identical to his own.
I mused: “So it’s a good job that you trust Neil implicitly, otherwise he could clean out all your bank accounts in one sweep.” John laughed, dismissively: “That will be the day.”
There was an unexpected hitch at the starting gate in Europe in 1964. Without warning, Ringo was taken ill with tonsillitis, creating a dilemma.
But Brian decreed the tour should go ahead and a replacement drummer named Jimmy Nicol found. He stepped into Ringo’s role perfectly – but not before another candidate was rehearsed and dismissed.
“Stick to the day job, Don,” said Paul as I climbed out of Ringo’s drum kit. Ringo quickly recovered and rejoined the group within a matter of days.
In September 1968, from a contact at Scotland Yard, I learned John and Yoko’s home was going to be raided.
Ethically, I knew it was the wrong thing to do, but John was a friend and I could not let him down. I warned him he was about to be busted.
They were then living in a flat in Montagu Square [in Central London] which had been occupied in the past by other rock stars including Jimi Hendrix.
Three weeks later, eight police officers descended on the house just after dawn. John and Yoko, who was pregnant, were still in bed and pretty well naked.
Constant knocking on the door and loud voices woke John who scrambled into his trousers to confront a policeman at a window. He yelled for Yoko to get their lawyer on the phone.
John and Yoko believed the house was entirely clear of any incriminating drugs, but police dogs sniffed out marijuana and quantities of hashish stashed in the most obscure places, even in a binocular case.
They were arrested and in a state of bewilderment were marched out to a police van to be charged with the possession of drugs. John, fearing Yoko might be deported as a result of the case, pleaded guilty in court and was fined £150.
He told his Apple colleagues: “Don Short had told us ‘They’re coming to get you,’ three weeks before.
So believe me I’d cleaned the house out because Jimi Hendrix had lived there. I’m not stupid. I went through the whole damn house.”
There was one small detail that John had overlooked. He had not counted on police sniffer dogs uncovering the evidence.
Paul McCartney invited me to attend his wedding to the American photographer Linda Eastman at Marylebone Register Office on March 12, 1969. It was an unexpected honour.
After many months of courtship Paul had finally popped the question.
But there was a hitch at the wedding. The best man, Paul’s brother Mike McGear [of The Scaffold pop group] was missing. Where was he? And what about the wedding ring in his pocket?
To kill time Paul, the last bachelor Beatle, began to sing the Stars and Stripes using a registrar’s notice on the wall as the lyrics.
Then, suddenly, and to the relief of the party, the door burst open and there was Mike crawling in on his hands and knees muttering: “Forgive me. It wasn’t my fault. The train broke down.”
Paul quipped: “That’s British Rail for you. Good old British Railways.”
He turned to me and suggested: “Here’s your Mirror headline Don: It wasn’t the bride or bridegroom who were late… it was the best man.”
Of course, those words were reproduced verbatim in the Mirror the next morning on our centre pages.
Eventually, it became clear a break-up could not be averted. All the signals were red. Most of the bitterness would heal in time but The Beatles, ignoring multi-million pound offers to reunite for just a single concert, were never tempted to perform together again.
