Entries tagged with “Beatles” from Patell and Waterman's History of New York

How's this for a Bermuda-New York connection: Turns out John Lennon stumbled on the name for his 1980 album with Yoko while he was vacationing in Bermuda. "Double Fantasy" was a flower on display at the botanical gardens in Paget Parish.

From a Beatle fan blog:

It was during one visit to the Botanical Gardens that Lennon famously came across the Double Fantasy freesia that was at the time being grown there. A plot of the freesia were planted near the front of Camden House and, under a cedar tree, Lennon is thought to have stopped and read an identity label with the name of the flower.

It is possible that one or two late straggler freesias may still have been around at the time Lennon came across the label, in any case he was struck by the name and, as he recalled in interviews later that year, decided it was the perfect title for the comeback album he writing.

Back at the rented house in Fairylands, Rolf Luthi occasionally turned up to check everything was all right at the house and to arrange for any repairs. One such problem arose with the outdated sewage system to the property. Rolf called for the White family plumbers to fix it.

As the plumbers were working four-year-old Sean Lennon kept saying to them "My daddy's a Beatle."

Rolf said: "They didn't know who was staying at the house and after Sean had said this for about the fifth time one of the White brothers replied 'Yeah, and my dad's a cockroach.'"

The rest here.

Less than a month after the album was released, John was killed. He was 40. Sean was 5, though in Yoko's song "Beautiful Boys" he'll always be 4.

Previously on AHNY.