Jane Asher and Paul McCartney (English Version)

SUMMER OF LOVE

On 19 May, Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band was launched with a small press party held at Brian Epstein's house at 24 Chapel Street. Linda Eastman was invited to the party as press photographer and was reunited with Paul.

Peter Brown: The girl who turned up at Chapel Street that May nineteenth wasn't the same sloppily dressed girl I had seen in my office a few days before. Her shiny blond hair was cut and washed and combed in a long, sweeping line under her chin. She wore impeccably applied makeup, including long, fluttering false eyelashes. She was dressed in a King's Road double-breasted, striped, barbershop jacket, with a short skirt that showed off her long legs. She held her Nikon in front of her and used it aggressively, probing with her lens. It wasn't long before she zeroed in on Paul. Paul sat in a chair by the fireplace in the lounge, dressed in pencil-striped trousers and a gray, striped jacket, nervously smoking cigarettes. He watched as Linda sank to her knees in front of the chair and began snapping photos of him.

Tony Bramwell: When Paul met Linda for the second time, the attraction he had felt for her was reinforced. Her blond hair was clean and shiny, her clothes simple and American "preppy." More, her gaze was direct, her smile sincere. She seemed to have a way that made everyone feel special, quite different from most of the Fleet Street stiffos there, who never looked at you when they spoke. Their eyes always raked the room beyond, as if convinced they were about to miss a scoop. Standing to one side with my drink and quietly observing, I noticed that Linda would lean forward and really listen. I saw how Paul liked her unpretentiousness. He seemed to me to be relaxed when talking to Linda in a way that he often wasn't with new people. He asked her for a date, but she said, “No, I have to return to New York." "Oh," Paul said. "Well, another time, then." "Sure, I'd like that," she said. I thought that only a girl who was well brought up and assured would turn down a Beatle. Most girls would have torn up their tickets and declared they could stay indefinitely.

Howard Sounes: In the few minutes she had before the photographers were ejected, Linda made a beeline for Paul, crouching at his feet by the fireplace, looking up into his face. He regarded her in return with mild interest, chin on hand, as if not sure what to make of her, a moment captured for posterity by one of the other photographers.