Fifty years ago this weekend, Friday, August 25, through Sunday August 27, 1972; The Beatles Away With Words was a multi-media extravaganza. A few weeks before this a man named Howard Ragland came into the Allen, asking about rental availability. We were sort of skeptical of this guy in a cowboy hat with the southwestern accent as he boasted of sellouts across the country. But when showtime rolled around, mobs swarmed the box office. There were three shows a day, at 8, 10 and midnight on Friday and Saturday, and at 4, 8 and 10 PM on Sunday, all nine were sold out. The show itself consisted of a 360 degree sound system, with the sound set at the maximum level. 26 film projectors and a wall of slide projectors bombarded the film screen with 6,000 slides. The show opened with a brief montage of rock and roll before the Beatles, then a quick Beatlemania segment, before heading into the much longer later Beatle era. It was a pretty intense experience, lots of images, clips, etc, and concert level sound, almost like a rock show without the band. Dick Wooten in the Cleveland Press didn’t care much for it, but the crowd did seem to enjoy it. A couple days before the show, when it was time to put the show up on the marquee, Ray was insistent that the Beatles, should be spelled Beetles, and it stayed that way all weekend, I seem to recall Jane Scott poking fun at us in her column. There was a guy from across the street, Gary something or other who had a purported love letter from Paul McCartney to Jane Asher. I'm not sure if this was authentic or not, but we had it on display in the rotunda for the weekend. Smitty and Poe (Ken Plocica) hooked up an 8-track player, which continuously played the first Rotary Connection longplayer. To this day their version of Ruby Tuesday is tattooed on my brain. There was also a girl who made copies of the purported love letter, they were sold for $1.00, which went to some charity. Ragland and his associate, whose name I can’t recall, were sort of shady individuals. On Saturday night they got a few counterfeit $20 dollar bills, which they passed at a local restaurant. By Monday morning, these guys had left town and the phone was ringing off the hook as hotels and other suppliers tried to collect on their bills. We took cash up front, so we did OK.
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