Louise Harrison-Caldwell, George Harrison’s elder sister, passed away on January 29, 2023. The only Beatle sister (although John had half-sisters), she served as an early door opener to America for George and the Beatles and was a nurturing presence in the Beatlemania era.
Being 12 years older, Louise held baby George in her arms for the first time on February 25, 1943, and later shared the experience. “I spent about five minutes holding him. Most newborn babies look like a wrinkled old (soccer) football, but because he was overdue, he arrived with a complete set of eyelashes, long hair, and fully grown fingernails. He was beautiful with big brown eyes, and at ten and a half pounds he already looked like most babies do at three months.”
She would move away from their Liverpool home to study child psychology in Newcastle-Upon-Tyne and earn a teaching degree. She would soon meet and marry Gordon Caldwell, a Scottish mining engineering executive, and emigrate to Ontario in 1956. Their corporate journey would take the family (now including two children) to Peru, Missouri, and in 1963, to settle in Benton, Illinois.
George was just 12 years old when she left the U.K. for her North American trek, but she kept in touch with her family in Liverpool, especially keen to keep up with George’s band. She served as George’s best connection for the hard-to-find American records that he was thirsty to experience. Big sister would soon hear that her little brother had achieved several chart-topping records back home; she shared his experience playing a royal command performance (including meeting the Queen) via long-distance phone calls.
George had been dating a local Liverpool girl named Marie Guirron just as he and the Beatles began their climb to success in the UK. According to Marie, George always had America on his mind. “George often used to say, ‘I’m definitely going to see my sister and her kid in America when I get a chance.’” Marie continued, “He used to play Chet Akins record for me while talking about America.”
Just as “She Loves You” was climbing the UK charts, soon to be the catalyst for Beatlemania, George jumped on a plane in September of 1963 to visit America. Bunking down in Benton with Louise and family, it was just 5 months before George would be forever introduced to the Americans via The Ed Sullivan Show.
For her part, Louise had left a 12-year-old boy, but now here he was at 20, tall and with all that hair! She gladly caught up on lost time, while George sucked up all of the American music and culture he could. “Being the experienced Beatle that I was, I went to New York then St. Louis to look around.” George later recalled, “I went to the countryside in Illinois, where my sister was living at the time. I went to record stores. I bought Booker T. and the MG’s first album, Green Onions, and bought some Bobby Bland, all kinds of things.” This was also the period when George purchased James Ray’s record, “I Got My Mind Set On You.” It would be another 24 years for George to record his last #1 hit with that very song.
George returned to England to report to the other Beatles and manager Brian Epstein what he saw and heard while in America. The news was not good. He proclaimed that, “They have everything over there, and don’t know us.” But upon departure from Benton, George had already indicated to Louise that cracking into the American market was going to be an uphill battle. This lit a fire under her and she dedicated the next few months to helping her little brother in any way she could. Indeed, when Epstein ramped up some of the greatest publicity strategies ever seen in the history of music entertainment, she was right there in Benton doing her best to help the band.
With little guidance from Epstein, Louise took it upon herself to promote the Beatles to any media outlet she could connect with in the area. She petitioned radio and TV stations, wrote letters to promoters, and made calls on the Beatles’ behalf. She also sent detailed letters to Brian about what he should be doing to present the Beatles in the American market. Epstein didn’t suffer fools gladly, but was careful with the Harrison family, as George’s parents were the most involved of the Beatles’ families in helping their fan club (in part because George was the only Beatle to come from a traditional two-parent family). But Louise’s efforts did bear fruit, as she eventually got “From Me To You” played on a local radio station in Illinois, the first known instance of the band getting on the mid-west airways during this period.
Eventually, the Epstein machine brought the Beatles to America in the first weeks of February of 1964, with all of its Beatlemania headlines. In the days leading up to their February 9th performance on the Sullivan show, George was confined to his NY Plaza Hotel room, stricken with strep throat (this is why we see press pictures of the Beatles posing in Central Park, with only 3 Fabs).
Although there would always be a frosty relationship between Louise and Brian Epstein, the manager swallowed his pride (a bit), as he arranged for her to fly to New York to comfort her guitarist brother. He knew this would be a great PR storyline- Big sister, who was by then a fellow friendly American, coming to her sick brother’s side while he was so far from his English home. Louise would not have wanted it any other way. (Epstein, known to be spiteful, would subsequently refuse to make her an official representative of his NEMS management organization).
A twist of irony came later in the decade, as one “Louise Caldwell” joined radio station KMOK of the St. Louis market as a copywriter and sometimes on-air personality. Just a few years before, KMOK was one of the stations encouraging the banning of Beatles records due to John Lennon’s remarks about organized Christianity. It’s unknown if Louise purposely kept her Harrison heritage a secret, but it would be many years before her co-workers knew of her Beatle connection. By then, the radio station had changed formats and wasn’t playing Beatles’ records anyway.
As Beatlemania subsided and the band broke up, but Louise stayed close to George even with the miles between them. She divorced, moved to California, and held several jobs. As George had already employed his two brothers (Harold and Peter, who managed his massive property in England), he saw to it to look after Louise in a remote way. George set up a reported $2,000 per month support plan for her beginning in 1980 that ran until his passing in 2001. Louise published an autobiography in 2014, My Kid Bother’s Band a.k.a The Beatles, that took the story from Liverpool to America and back to her private life of rearing children through two divorces.
After George’s passing in 2001, Louise’s last known music-oriented project was to manage a Beatles tribute band called Liverpool Legends. She eventually (and ironically) began a 15+ year relationship with the guy who played her brother on stage, Marty Scott. She told the world, “He [Scott] filled the space that George left in my life in many, many ways.”
George Harrison’s elder sister Louise passed away at age 91 in a hospice unit in Sarasota, Florida.
-Steven Valvano
Photo: George Harrison (Getty)
John did not have step-sisters, he had half-sisters (Julia’s daughters) Julia (born in 1947) & Jacqueline (1949), born to his mother Julia and John “Bobby” Dykins. She also had a daughter with Vernon “Taffy” Williams named Victoria who was given up for adoption in 1945. John also had two half-brothers by his father Alfred and Pauline Jones (David, born in 1969, and Robin, born in 1973)
You are correct… I used the wrong term… I should have used “half sisters.” Thank you for your close attentive reading!- SV
..twist of irony came later… as one “Louise Caldwell” joined radio station KMOK of the St. Louis market.
…Just a few years before, KMOK was one of the stations encouraging the banning of Beatles records due to John Lennon’s remarks about organized Christianity.
….It’s unknown if Louise purposely kept her Harrison heritage a secret
…..By then, the radio station had changed formats and wasn’t playing Beatles’ records anyway.
This is ALL wrong.
First of all, KMOX 1120 am (St Louis) was never playing ‘top 40’.
Mainly (then and still now) KMOX is news, sports and ‘talk’. I listed to Cardinals, (BB/FB) Hawks (basketball) and other sports events.
In the 60’s, KXOK 630 am was key ‘top 40’ music station in St Louis
They were on the Beatles bandwagon from the beginning. Late 1963, I was listening.
By mid 1964, “Louise Harrison Caldwell” was doing 5 min segments in the afternoon (4:30 I recall) offering the latest Beatle news. With the connection to her brother obvious. No secret.
Also, the later banning stuff (1966) was really not a big deal in the St Louis (KXOK/KMOX) radio market. Mostly it happened in the ‘deep south’.
To be fair, Paul came from a “traditional, two-parent family”…right up until his mother died. And he would eventually gain a “half-sister” when his father remarried.
Right you are! … these half-siblings can be tricky 🙂 – SV
Steve, Ruth was his step-sister, not half-sister. She was born in 1960 to his stepmother Angie from her first husband, not Jim McCartney, who she married in 1964.