George Harrison was born in Liverpool, England, on February 25, 1943, to Louise (née French), a Liverpool shop assistant, and Harold Hargreaves Harrison, a bus conductor. George was the last of four children, and he was born in the house where he lived for his first six years: 12 Arnold Grove, Wavertree, Liverpool.
When the Beatles landed on US soil in February 1964, it was George Harrison‘s second trip to the states. While on vacation in September 1963, he visited his sister, Louise, at 113 McCann Street in Benton, Illinois. The home where he stayed in is now the Hard Day’s Nite Bed and Breakfast. While in Illinois, Harrison also performed with a band at the Veterans of Foreign Wars hall in Eldorado.
In an interview, Louise recalled “his real first visit to America was when he came to the midwest in September of 1963 and he met these wonderful, warm, friendly, real warm Midwesterners… school teachers, retired miners and all kinds of just wonderful people… and a little band. He had a fantastic time. He thought they were just wonderful people.”
The cover illustration for the Revolver album was created by artist and bassist Klaus Voormann. German-born Voormann was a friend of the Beatles, dating back to their early days when they played at the Star Club in Hamburg, Germany. In 1966, Voormann was asked by John Lennon to design the album sleeve for Revolver. Klaus came up with a “scrapbook collage” for the cover. The band and their manager, Brian Epstein, loved the result. Voormann was paid £40 for the design. He would later receive a Grammy Award for Best Album Cover, Graphic Arts for this work.
Over 20 years later, Voormann would design the cover art for George Harrison’s 1988 single, “When We Was Fab”. This design included the image of Harrison from the Revolver cover along with an updated drawing in the same style.
In 1995, Voormann designed the covers for The Beatles Anthology albums for Apple Records. He, and fellow artist Alfons Kiefer, painted the covers.
Klaus was the bassist for the British band Manfred Mann, and later a session player and record producer. He occasionally played bass with some of the ex-Beatles’, either for studio recordings or live performances, and was a member of John Lennon and Yoko Ono’s Plastic Ono Band.
Paul McCartney and George Harrison first met on a bus while the two were schoolboys. They rode the bus together going to and from the Liverpool Institute High School for Boys and found they shared an interest in music and playing guitars. Harrison recalled, “It was on that bus journey that I met Paul McCartney, because he, being at the same school, had the same uniform and was going the same way as I was so I started hanging out with him.”
When McCartney was in John Lennon’s skiffle band The Quarrymen, he strongly urged Lennon to allow Harrison to join the band as lead guitarist. After all, George could play “Raunchy” (by Bill Justice) and that was quiet impressive. Lennon thought the fifteen-year-old Harrison to be far too young, but eventually he relented.
