Mimi Smith

Smith and his brother, Frank Smith, operated a dairy farm and a shop in Woolton that had been in the Smith family for four generations. Smith started courting Mimi, but was constantly thwarted by her indifference and her father's interference. Stanley would only allow the couple to sit in the back room at Newcastle Road when he or his wife were in the front room, and before it grew too late he would burst into the back room and loudly order Smith home. The courtship lasted almost seven years, but Smith grew tired of waiting. After delivering milk to the hospital one morning he gave her an ultimatum that she must marry him, "or nothing at all!" Read Less

Julia (who knew that her son would be performing) heard music coming from the field behind the church (now the site of the Bishop Martin School), and pulled Mimi along with her to listen. Lennon saw his aunt coming through the crowd and comically changed the words of a song to feature her name: "Oh-oh, here comes Mimi down the aisle now " Mimi related two versions of what she thought that day after seeing Lennon on stage: "I was horrified to behold John in front of a microphone", and "as pleased as Punch to see him up there".

With help from Mimi and Lennon's headmaster, Lennon was accepted into the Liverpool College of Art because his aunt insisted that he should have some sort of academic qualifications, even though Lennon was beginning to show an interest in music. She opposed the idea of him forming a band and disapproved of McCartney because he was, "working class", calling him "John's little friend". When she later met Harrison, she "hated him" because of his thick Liverpudlian accent and Teddy Boy clothes. Lennon and McCartney often met at Mendips to write songs, and rehearsed in the glass-panelled porch at the front of the house, which was the only place they were allowed to play. She once asked Parkes to take her to The Cavern to see Lennon play, but when she descended into the damp, dark cellar; full of screaming teenagers, she shouted to Parkes, "Get him Lennon out, get him out! Read Less