Fun in the Sun

I think I have posted these photos from when the Beatles were at Sumerset in 1963. They are back in the news again because they are up for auction. I knew they were taken by a fan, but I did not know that the fan was an 11 year old boy! Amazing photos from a kid. I like these so much that I will forgive George for wearing socks with sandals.

These previously unseen photos show the Beatles having not such a Hard Day’s Night but relaxing in a seaside hotel in 1963, just months before their global rise to fame.

In one shot the Fab Four are seen sun bathing topless on the terrace - except for John Lennon who is still donning a dark waistcoat and shirt. In the background a pasty-looking gentleman is sunbathing in his underpants, oblivious to his famous neighbours.

In another Ringo Starr and Paul McCartney take afternoon tea out of china cups as a group of old ladies sit in armchairs nearby.

A third picture shows the group relaxing on deck chairs with Ringo waving and the fourth shows George Harrison sharing a pot of tea with a friend.

The candid photos were taken at a hotel in Weston Super Mare, Somerset, by schoolboy Bruce Leak then aged 11 who was on a family holiday with his parents and sister.

The family spoke to John Lennon, then 23, Paul, then 21, George, then 20, and Ringo, then 23, while they ate their breakfast at the hotel.

The band had just had a UK number one single with Please Please Me and an album hit with the same title. Just months earlier they had signed to Parlophone Records and were spending the year touring around British towns, playing in Margate, Leeds and Yarmouth, and were gaining popularity. As they arrived in Weston-super-mare, on the other side of the pond a U.S. LP was being released called Introducing the Beatles.

Despite getting the amazingly candid pictures of the Beatles before they hit the big time, Bruce kept his amazing snaps in a drawer for decades - thinking that they were ‘rubbish’ and ‘worth nothing.’

When he passed away last year aged 59, his sister, Ann O’Neill, 73, inherited them and decided to auction them off in the hope that they will fall into good hands.

Mrs O’Neill, from Wigan, Greater Manchester, said: ‘My brother had the pictures for years but thought that they were a load of rubbish and they were worth nothing.

‘But when he passed away in February last year I inherited them. I thought it such a shame to throw them away but they are too much of a reminder of my brother to keep them.’

Ann’s mum Edith is in two of the pictures. 'She is walking out the door in one and the other she is sitting with them at breakfast,' said Ann.

‘She said they were very friendly and chatty and looked very relaxed like they didn’t have a care in the world, but this was before their fame grew.’

The siblings remained big Beatles fans and Bruce had some of their music played at his funeral.

The photographs are to be auctioned on tomorrow at Omega Auctions in Stockport, Greater Manchester, are expected to make up to £400.

Paul Fairweather, an auctioneer at Omega, said: ‘We have estimated for the set of four photos a value of £300-400 because they are quite candid pictures we think that they will go for more than others of their kind.

‘The most interesting one is the one of all four of them where they are sat outside; John is reading and the others are sat with their shirts off.

‘They look really relaxed not worrying about anything unlike in later years when they couldn’t go anywhere without being hounded. It was a rare chance for them to take in the sunshine.

‘It was in 1963 around the Please Please Me era, right in the beginning of their fame. They had been playing for about six months I think at this time.

‘Brian Epstein signed them to Parlaphone at the end of 1962 so I guess they would have been down to London before then but you can see that they are still young and fresh faced.’

As well as the photographs, an 8mm film of the Beatles 1963 tour which was donated by another collector is going under the hammer.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2105787/Beatles-fans-unseen-photos-Fab-Four-having-fun-sun.html#ixzz1nveu3BCl