The day the Beatles came to every town (and the man who paved the way)

It was early evening and my brother and I were standing in the middle of 11th Street waiting for our friend Richard to sneak out of the Southside Baptist Church.

We were just a couple of kids, 9 and 10 years old, trying to squeeze the last bit of mischief out of a weekend disappearing into the twilight. Our mother -- who didn't get overly excited, not even that time I rode my tricyle down our front porch's concrete steps, swallowing the left handlebar on the ride -- was waving somewhat excitedly, having materialized on that porch in the way peculiar to mothers of that time.

So we slouched back toward the house, sure we were being shafted at best and possibly about to be punished for some violation of the rules that, chances are, we had forgotten almost as quickly as the deed was done.

"You have to see this," she said. In the center of the living room sat our black-and-white TV, a contrary contraption that had a buzz that would follow the rise and fall of certain auto transmissions as the car passed by. And, it was prone to "rolling," which required the adjustment of the horizontal and vertical holds seasoned with some salty language.

On the screen, I could tell by the set, was "The Ed Sullivan Show." Great. Topo Gigio. Or, to my dad's annoyance, "plate spinners."

Except the audience was different. Younger. Noticeably female. And they were far more excited than my mother, who was as excited as I had seen her get over a TV show.

Then out came the Beatles. They were different. No crew cuts. No jeans. No duck-tail haircuts.

To understand what an earthquake that caused, you have to understand where we were.

Christopher, Ill., wasn't exactly the center of the universe, though I would have argued that point at the time. New products that could be seen on TV often came and went without making it to Christopher.

I don't know exactly how long it took the first Beatle wig to arrive in town but it seems like it was days rather than months. The teachers let the younger kids head up the hall, in an orderly fashion, to gawk at the ill-fitting hairpiece worn by someone in the upper grades at Christopher Elementary School. Beatles equipment was everywhere. Boots. Wigs. Magazines. Books. Bubblegum cards. Singles. Albums. Posters.

Bringing the Beatles home wasn't so easy. We didn't have a stereo, just a Philco that played my mom and dad's 78s. The Beatles spun at 45 and 33 rpm. But we wouldn't shut up about the depravation of living in a Beatle-less household. Eventually, my dad caved and bought a portable stereo and an aluminum stand so we could roll it to whichever room he wasn't in.

He sprang for one album, "Meet the Beatles." And my brother and I got busy trying to make him regret both decisions, either playing that album incessantly or arguing just as loud and long over which song was the best or which Beatle we'd rather be.

Dad by then had most likely begun to wonder if he should have encouraged us to become plate spinners.

All this, in my usual bizarre thinking, is a tribute to George Martin, the record/recording producer who died Tuesday at 90. It's not that I doubt the Beatles would have made it without him -- although you could make that case since everyone in England had passed on them. Martin, the story goes, didn't think much of them either though he was intrigued by John Lennon and Paul McCartney's singing.

Martin, who had been producing comedy albums, baroque and chamber music, heard something in those vocals that he would refine into the Beatles' sound. And it was that sound that explains why two boys who had yet to hold a girl's hand much less whisper secrets into her ear would spend so much time listening to four young men sing about such holding and whispering. I in fact had yet to leave behind the "you've got (fill in with the girl you'd like to torment)'s germs and I've got shots" stage of social discourse.

Years later, I began to appreciate the words. But for the time being, it was that sound, their look and the bonus points for making girls faint that kept me sitting in front of that stereo.

Contact Paul Hampton, politics editor at the Sun Herald at 228-896-2330 or jphampton@sunherald.com. Follow him on Twitter@jpaulhampton.

This story was originally published March 12, 2016 at 6:37 PM with the headline "The day the Beatles came to every town (and the man who paved the way) ."