It was like meeting the Pope

 

Thea Hoving with John Lennon

The Beatles with Tom Hoving

All photographs taken by Walter Darren

"It was Like Meeting the Pope"

The Daily News (New York, NY)

August 13, 1995

Seven-year-old Trea having lived the dream as the daughter of the man responsible for the Shea concert parks commissioner, Thomas Huffing. She got to meet John Lennon and the other Beatles backstage. Here's her story:

     I was scared to death. I remember walking to meet them and thinking, "This is like meeting the Pope." I have no idea why. Then, when I got there, I barely lifted my eyes. I was so scared. John Lennon was extremely cool. He had this wry sense of humor. Actually, that photograph being taken where I look like I have a major attitude, that was just the camera grabbing me at the right moment. In reality, I was completely scared.

     Paul McCartney, though, was totally adorable. He was trying to be really childish to open me up. It was very cute. I remember he scribbled something on the back of an envelope and was showing it to me. And when I think back on it, the image looked like it was a Blue Meanie, but that was way before the Yellow Submarine. 

    The whole time, George and Ringo were there, but they were in the back, sort of in the periphery.

     After that, I went out front with my best friend for the concert. My dad had gotten us great tickets, and the whole thing was electrifying. Even at the age of seven, I was aware of the importance of it. It was the first real mega concert. It was amazing. It was the coolest thing.

     Then these two teenage girls convinced us to let them sit in our seats, and we could sit on their laps, and they spent the whole time screaming. We thought that that they were crazy. I was in love with the guys in the band.

     After the show, my cousin, who hadn't gotten to go backstage, kept wiping my hands, trying to wipe all the Beatle-juices that had gotten on me. I still think about it all the time. I think I've probably had dreams of trying to lift my head up and have a conversation with John Lennon.  In my teenage years, I went to other concerts, but nothing was The same sort of rampage as that Shea concert. 

As the parks commissioner of New York City in 1965 Thomas  Hoving was the man who gave permission for the Shea concert. He took his family backstage to meet the Beatles. Here's how he recalls that day:

    I remember one thing very distinctively, and that was that after taking my daughter into the locker room, these four young men surrounded by press, press agents, and all sorts of people jumped up and ran toward me to thank me effusively for having them in this thing, all four of them. That sort of thing just doesn't happen. 

    Years later, when I was asked to testify for John Lennon when he was coming into this country, I relayed that anecdote from Shea Stadium. I said to the judge, "This is a man of great charm and politeness, and he ought to be allowed into the country." And the judge said, "How would you characterize him as an artist?" and I told him that "if he were a painter, John Lennon's work would be hanging in the Metropolitan Museum of Art."

     The other thing I remember from the concert was that we had suspected there'd be some rough stuff, so we built this huge proscenium over the pitcher's mound at Shea with an armored car underneath so that they could just jump down and escape if it got unruly. And it did get unruly. People started jumping over the barricade, and cops were tackling people, and I thought you could smell riot in the air. Fortunately, there wasn't one.

     With that photo, my daughter, I think, didn't wash her hand for at least 10 days and was gaining all sorts of prestige in school, but at the time, she was overwhelmed. It was one of the rare times in her life when she was struck dumb. The Beatles were so bloody sweet; it was a moment of great history.