#ivan vaughn

[harrisonarchive]

Happy birthday, Paul!

There isn’t enough caption space for all these quotes, so I’ve compiled these slides highlighting aspects of the decades-long friendship between George and Paul. Photo credits as known: Paul McCartney, George Harrison, Astrid Kirchherr, ITV, Emilio Lari, Jim Marshall, Linda McCartney, Harry Benson, screenshots from The Beatles Anthology, Mary McCartney.

[nemperor]

On this important holiday, don’t forget to thank the man who made it all possible

[sgtpeppers]

Days We Left Behind by Paul McCartney (Part 1/2)

[ceofjohnlennon]

The photo of George Harrison used in the lyrics video for Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr's song "Home To Us": Paul McCartney, Ivan Vaughan, and George Harrison in Liverpool, 1958. Ivan introduced Paul to John, and the rest is history.

[bodhbdearg]

I am so tickled by this description of Ivan Vaughn (both himself as a character and vis-à-vis John) because it is so unlike anything I have read about him, or John, before! Granted, it's just one guy's opinion, but it raises so many interesting possibilities - like, could later fame influence the memories of some people who knew these guys growing up, causing them to retrospectively ascribe them superhuman qualities (natural leader, creative genius etc etc), while more level-headed others could be like "sure he was interesting, but he was also Just Another Guy, and he could've been influenced by this other cool guy we all knew that you've never heard of!"

Text and source below the cut

But it was Ivan Vaughan who stood out even more to [Peter] Sissons and, he claims, to the school in general. "He was the only other key figure there at the time who I would have thought would make it as some sort of creative personality. He stood out head and shoulders above everybody." The dominating feature of Vaughan's life was "an entirely distinctive sense of humor." This, in turn, was influenced by "The Goon Show," the British radio humor program starring Peter Sellers, Spike Milligan, Harry Secombe, and Michael Bentine to which every schoolboy would avidly tune in. But Vaughan's surreal originality extended even beyond that, being, according to Sissons, "some ten or fifteen years ahead of his time." A fatherless boy, one of the many members of the cast surrounding Paul McCartney who had lost a parent, Vaughan one day painted his name in three-foot-high letters across the front of the house while his mother was out. Another time, he arrived at school with, for no apparent reason, the dull appearance of his regulation black shoes having been altered by a thick, vivid coat of canary yellow paint. Later Vaughan employed a more subtle creativity with regard to his footwear: playing truant for days at a time, he would reappear at the Institute with an explanatory note, in his own carefully disguised handwriting, declaring his absence to have been caused by "shoes gone to the menders" —an absolute masterstroke, for what member of the staff would dare question the undreamt tales of poverty and hardship that lay behind such circumstances?

"John Lennon was a highly original character," sums up Peter Sissons. "But in my opinion, much of the outrageousness and unpredictability he displayed later in life came from Ivan Vaughan, and not the other way round."

Source: McCartney by Chris Salewicz (1986)

Notes:

This book doesn't have citations (grr) so it's unclear if this is an interview Salewicz carried out or sourced from elsewhere, but either way the presence of quotation marks indicates that it is the interviewee's original words.

Peter Sisson (d. 2019) is familiar to UK people of a certain age as a BBC News presenter from the 1990s-2000s. He also turned into a bit of a rightwing slime in later life so I wouldn't blame anyone for giving side-eye to his credibility based on that. Fwiw, he doesn't appear to have been completely on this path in the early 80s when this interview was presumably carried out.

[historyinthemakingamazingfinds]

“In 1958 Liverpool, Paul McCartney and George Harrison were captured alongside their close friend Ivan Vaughan, a figure instrumental in shaping rock history. Ivan, born in 1942, shared a unique bond with Paul—they were born on the same day, attended the Liverpool Institute, and often exchanged their love for music. On July 6, 1957, Ivan famously introduced 15-year-old Paul to 16-year-old John Lennon at St. Peter’s Church in Woolton, where John’s skiffle band, The Quarrymen, was performing. Paul impressed John with his ability to tune a guitar and play Eddie Cochran’s Twenty Flight Rock, leading to his invitation to join the group—a moment that set the foundation for The Beatles.

By 1958, Paul had become a key member of The Quarrymen, and he introduced his school friend George Harrison, a 14-year-old guitar prodigy, to the band. George auditioned for John on the top deck of a bus and, despite initial hesitations about his age, was soon welcomed into the group. Meanwhile, Ivan pursued academics, studying classics at University College London. Though he didn’t join The Beatles, he remained a lifelong friend, offering creative inspiration—including co-writing the surreal Yellow Submarine phrase “Sky of blue, sea of green” with Paul. Ivan’s role in shaping The Beatles' origins was pivotal, as without his introduction, history may have unfolded differently.

As The Beatles rose to fame, Ivan ventured into education, later working with autistic children, while maintaining friendships with Paul and George. Diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease in the 1980s, he passed away in 1993, leaving behind an unsung legacy in music history. His introduction of Paul to John forged one of the most iconic songwriting duos, proving that a single meeting in a Liverpool churchyard could spark a revolution that would change music forever.”

Source: Facebook

Brighter Days of History

[mythserene]

Lewisohn has definitely gotten weirder over the years.

Some Ivan Vaughn weirdness from Lewisohn's latest, very weird, interview that made me think about Phoebe and Daphne and all the weirdness they caught in Fine Tuning.

Lewisohn says John and Ivan's parental figures introduced them in the hope that they might play together, but also Ivan went to Liverpool Institute—the superior school to Quarry Bank—because Ivan's mum didn't want him to play with John. And Paul and Ivan might not have met (despite both being at the Inny) had they not had the same birthday? I must be missing some bit of trivia because what does that mean??

(transcription below)

John and Paul “met because they had a mutual friend.”

That mutual friend was the friend of John because he lived in the house behind John. And in those days parents, or parent figures—John was raised by his aunt—but if there were other little boys in the neighborhood, you would be introduced in the hope that you might play together. I don't know that that happens any more, but it did happen in those days. And in Paul's case, because Paul had gone to a particular school, um, this friend-- this mutual friend-- this friend of John's, Ivan, he was at the school, the same as Paul. And they had the same birthday, so they'd been introduced to one another. If they hadn't have had the same birthday they may not have even been-- ever been met. So, and it's-- and also, the reason that Ivan was at that school and not the more local one was his mother had said “you're not going to the same school as John Lennon” 'cause he was the kind of boy that other parents always kept their children away from if possible.

Daphne and Phoebe definitely caught that Lewisohn invented the idea that Ivan would have gone to Quarry Bank but for John being such a bad boy. (They didn't say “invented,” but they knew it, and after four months of being a Lewisohn Sherlock Holmes I'll say it. He made it up. There is no support for it outside Lewisohn's delusional mind.)

AKOM 📍

[ljblueteak]

Linda on what she liked about Paul when staying with him during the White Album period

LINDA: I stayed for a few weeks, while they were finishing the White Album...What I liked about Paul when I lived there in London was the books that were around and painting. Paul would say, 'Let's paint,' and he and Ivan Vaughan would get paints and go down in the basement and the three of us would paint on the canvas. It was fun. Paul is so much more cerebral than people think, because he was quote 'the cute Beatle'. I hate this 'Was it John or was it Paul?' thing because they were both talented. They were both artists. They are equal for number one.

From: Many Years From Now, by Barry Miles