Sunday, January 13, 2013

Tune in!


This is from the Antique Road Show's facebook page.   A little closer look at Leslie's Paul photo.


Another reminder for those of you in the U.S.A. that the episode that features Leslie (Samuels) Healey and her John Lennon autograph will be on PBS at 8 eastern (7 Central).   Make sure to tune in if you can.   It is awesome to have one of our own showcasing something Beatle-fan related on T.V.    Let's all hope for Leslie that Paul is watching as well.   

Rick Smith from the Standard-Times wrote a wonderful article that is well worth reading.   I am also posting the photos from the article (with Leslie's permission) because they are so great.   

Leslie's autographed photo of George at Kinfauns (in color!)

Leslie with Ringo in 1967 at his home at Sunny Heights
 Leslie Healy's "Beatles story" begins like this: "I have always been in the right place at the right time, and I've been blessed," began the San Angelo Realtor.

Who can argue with her?

As a 14-year-old New Yorker, she screamed along with a crowd of other teen girls in Ed Sullivan's auditorium as the Beatles performed.

"They were amazing," she said. "I couldn't hear anything they were singing for the screaming. I don't even know why I was screaming, but I was."

After that she knew what she had to do.

"From that day on, I said when I graduated I was going to England to see the Beatles."
Some friends called her crazy, but she planned her strategy carefully.

"I was the head of one of many New York Beatles fan clubs," she explained. Her club "had a whole bunch of kids in it, and I got to know people."
At age 17, she flew to London for a "study abroad" program.
Her first stop was to study the Beatles. Thanks to her Beatles fan club contacts, she figured out how to find the Fab Four.

"I knocked on their door, and they let me in," she said. "It was so cool."
Now, decades later, Leslie has dozens, maybe hundreds of stories about her Beatles days.
She also has scrapbooks full of pictures of the Beatles and Beatles-related keepsakes.
Recently she took several of her treasures to Corpus Christi for an appraisal by the experts from the "Antiques Roadshow."

"I love watching the show on TV," she said. "It's fascinating."
PBS's highest-rated series, "Antiques Roadshow," travels to different cities each season. The show's experts appraise items brought to them by people who flock to the taping. Almost 10 million viewers see the weekly show.

Traveling to Corpus Christi last summer to be part of the show, Leslie again was in the right place at the right time.

One of the show's appraisers studied the Beatles items. What she said surprised Leslie.

The memorabilia included a book written and autographed by John Lennon, a picture Leslie shot of Paul McCartney reading to her from the book, and a taped recording she made of Paul's reading.
Leslie said she's familiar with the prices of vintage records and autographs, but she wasn't certain what her Beatles souvenirs might bring.

"I thought the book might bring $2,000," she said.

Instead, the appraiser said it might fetch thousands more at an auction. Even though many Beatles autographs are counterfeit, Leslie's autographed book had the ring of truth, thanks to the photo and recording of Paul reading the book.

I asked her if she would be willing to sell her treasured book at an auction.
"I don't know," she told me, shaking her head.

Leslie's story took an interesting turn in the early 1980s when she once again found herself in the right place at the right time.

In 1981 she moved to San Angelo to buy a kennel and start a business. Almost immediately she met another Texas transplant, Matt Healy.

"We came from totally different backgrounds," she said. "We fascinated each other."

They married in 1982, and the couple now run their own real estate business, San Angelo Homes Realtors.

"Spouses Selling Houses," their business card reads.

The Beatles once changed her world, she said, but "Matt changed my world, and still does, every day.
"And that's my Beatles story, in a nutshell."

The episode with Leslie is scheduled to air at 7 p.m. Monday on PBS stations.

9 comments:

  1. i looove leslie's stories! we don't get pbs here in brazil but i'll look for it on youtube tomorrow.

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  2. That's Leslie up above all right and she looks great in the photo. Thanks to Leslie I met some of the Beatles too several times and once again later on. thanks Leslie

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    1. Joyce! Ms Ettingoff! Would love to hear YOUR stories!!!!

      I love love love the Leslie tape(s), they are hilarious! She actually tells Paul..."sometimes you put your foot in your mouth!" HA!!!! You have to love her for that!!!

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  3. I'd love to share some of the stories I have with you some time. I have never heard the Leslie tapes except at the time they were done and I don't have the Leslie Beatle Books either. It was a group of us girls who went to London with Leslie in 1968 in the summer so I'm sure the others have some great stories too. Let me know what's out there.

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    1. Joyce: here are the "Little Girl Tapes" aka the tapes Leslie made in the summer of 67, interviewing Paul and George! Just download this zipped folder! Hope it brings back some memories!!!

      https://www.dropbox.com/s/lnqk9jvk5xcnmec/1967-07-12%20The%20Little%20Girl%20Tapes.zip?dl=0



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  4. Link for the Leslie tapes does not work here. My email is speedlad@aol.com. Try to send them there if you can. Nice thing about this is that I have gotten in touch with Leslie again and it is good to see how things turned out for all of us.

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    1. Hopefully our friend, Michael will see this message and send them directly to you. I met Leslie at Beatlefest in New York in 2014 and she is a lovely lady. Glad that you all are doing well these days.

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  5. After Leslie Healey's comments that she was present stood opposite Apple HQ on Savile Row during the rooftop concert, now the alternate LET IT BE film is set for release including alternate reels not in original film, there should be a Leslie-Alert for sharp-eyed Beatles fans to see if we can spot a young woman on the street in dark red coat with black and white collie dog and possible notebook writing down the lyrics she heard. That's Leslie Healey. Surviving Beatle fans of that era who were there that day will wonder if the unused footage shows them in the gathering crowds and passersby. What a buzz for them if they are! coming back out of the past more than 50 years ago. Can you do a blog on that, Sara? is there enough known people-who-were-there on the street?

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    1. That sure is an interesting story! Leslie is a sweetheart and I love chatting with her. I will see if I can locate anyone else that might have been on the street that day.

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