LINDA EASTMAN

Linda Louise Eastman was born on September 24, 1941. Her father, Lee eastman, was an affluent lawyer, who had canged his name from Epstein and collected expensive works of art. He had also made a large amount of money taking care of several showbusiness. Her father's speciality was copyright law in the showbusiness field and he once agreed to undertake legal work for songwriting Jack Lawrence in exchange for a song dedicated to his six-year-old daughter. Lawrence penned "Linda" late in 1947 and in 1963 it was recorded by Jan & Dean.

Linda's mother, Louise Eastman, was the daughter of a rich Cleveland family, the Linders, who owned major department stores. Like Linda's father, she had also studied in the Law Univeristy of Harvard with excelent results. The family home was in Scarsdale, Westchester County, in upstate New York. It was like Weybridge in London. They also owned a house in East Hampton and a luxurious flat in Park Avenue.

During her formative years, Linda was used to misxing with celebrity guests who were invited to dinner parties at the house, such as William Boyd (the screen's Hopalong Cassidy), Hoagy Carmichael and Tommy Dorsey. Linda has said:

Linda did not followed in their parents footsteps, educated in Harvard. She played truant from school to travel to shows at the Paramount Theatre in Brooklyn:

She was educated at Scarsdale High School. However, her stay at this Insititute did not claim Kinda as one of its best students. The year annuary describes her as a blonde very keen on men. Her brother John would follow indeed in his parents footsteps and years later would be the one moving to London to handle all the Beatles affairs.

At the age of eighteen, Linda's world fell to pieces when her mother died in a plane crash. Linda had gone to Princenton University to sudy History and Art. Her mother's derath affected her so much that she rushed into marriage with a fellow student, Melvin See. Linda recalled:

She always regretted. She realized things wouldn't work out:

They'd moved to Tucson, Arizona, and Linda had become pregnant. She gave birth to her first daughter Heather on 31 December 1963. Se, who was a geophysicist, still hoped that Linda would follow him to Africa but she wrote to him a letter telling him she was getting a divorce.

The marriage had only lasted a year, but while she lived in Arizona, Linda had studied Art History at the University of Arizona and had attended a short course on photography given by Hazel Archer at Tucson Art Centre. It was then that she first began taking photographs. She was to say:

linda's break into the professional word of photography had begun when she and Heather movef to New York. Linda was holding down a job as receptionist for Town & Country magazine when an invitation to cover a reception for the Rolling Stones on a boat on the Hudson came in -she snapped it up, and found she was the only photographer on board! The photographs established her reputation, she secured an unpaid, but prestigious position as the house photographer at the Fillmore East, a popular rock venue which featured major British and American acts, and began to receive commissions to photograph leading bands such as the Beach Boys. From then on she dicedied to use her attractiveness and photogpraph skills to meet all the bands that came to the city.

She photographed the Beatles in 1965 in Austria during the filming of Help!, but says that she first met them officially at the Shea Stadium in 1966. She was to recall:

However, Linda had already awaken Paul's attention. in May 1968, paul arrived in New York to promote Apple and gave a number of press conferences. At one of them, Linda slipped him her telephone number and he got in touch and spent a few days with her, meeting at Nat Weiss' flat. Paul became charmed by Heather to the extent that he baby-sat while Linda went out to take photographs at a rock gig at the Fillmore East. When Paul returned to London, Linda sent him an ampliation of a photograph of himslef with Heather kissing him on the head. McCartney flipped over it.

Yet, their relationship didn't set up dtaright away, for, besides being officially engaged to jane Asher, Paul was dating the colour model Winona Williams. But Linda travelled to Los Angeles, where Paul was at that moment, to tell him she was pregnant, although fourteen months would go by before she gave birth to their daughter Mary.

After splitting up with Jane because of his relationship with Franzine Scwartz, an American journalist, Linda and Paul started their relationship.

She said. And the occasion did seem to be hastily arranged. Linda, four motnhs pregnant with mary, went to Marylebone Register Office on 11 March 1969, to book it for the next day at 9:45 a.m. Paul was in the studio recording Javkie Lomax singing "Thumbin' A Ride" and, engrossed as he was in his work, forgot to buy a wedding ring. As he had an early start the next day, he had to pursuade a local jeweller to open his shop after closing time. He bought a plain gold ring for twelve pounds.

On the morning of 12 March, determined fans, photographers and journalists, undaunted by the rain, gathered at Paul's Cavendish Avenue house from 6:00 a.m. onwards, hoping to catch a glimpse of the couple. Girl fans weeped all through the cermenoy and even before because the onlt bachelor Beatle stopped being it and so they lost the opportunity of becoming Paul's wives. Mike McCartney was best man, but his train from Liverpool was delayed and he arrived an hour late. He rushed into the register Office saying: ·Forgive me, it wasn't my fault. Have you been done?" Fortunately there had been no other weddings booked for that morning, and Paul was able to answer: "No, we've been waiting for you". Linda's daugter Heather was bridesmaid and Peter Brown and mal Evans were witnesses. none of the Beatles turned up as Paul had already started litigation to dissolve the group. The ceremony was conducted by Registar Mr. E. R. Sanders, and the marriage was blessed afterwards at the Anglican Church in St John's Wood by the Rev. Noel Perry-Gore.

On the couple's return to Cavendish Avenue, the press were invited in and given champagne while Paul and Linda answered their questions. A rumour had spread that Linda was a rich heiress of the Kodak_Eastman family, but she quickly scotched it, saying that she had nothing to do with them. Paul quipped, "What? I've been done. Where's the money?" Once the press had been satisfied, Paul and Linda went on to the wedding reception proper at the Ritz Hotel, Picadully. Later that evening, Paul eturned to the studios to complete the production of the Jackie Lomax single.

Unfortunately, around this time, Beatle fans who hung around Paul's house became quite nasty with Linda. While they had accepted Jane Asher as a suitable girlfriend and potential wife for Paul, they resented Linda and she received a degree of abuse from them. Nono could work out what Paul could have seen in her. They accused her of being hairy and not waxing her legs. They said she was hairier than Paul.

One of the first songs which Paul wrote after the marriage was "The Lovely Linda". Paul officially adopted Heather as his daughter.

But Linda ended up droping out the band and dedicated exclusively to the events related to photography, like Paul's records covers or the picture that immortalised the new meeting of the three Beatles to record new songs alongside John's voice. She even recorded something under the pseudonym "Suzy and the red stripes" for her record ·Seaside Woman". She was also involved in two animation films, "The Oriental Nigthfish" and "Seaside Woman".

Linda was to strech herself still further and, in addition to photographic exhibitions of her work in various galleries around the world and her growing authority as a musician in the various world tours undertaken with Paul, she appeared in a cameo role in the popular TV series ·Bread", set in Liverpool and scripted by Linda's friend Carla Lane. Linda also had a best selling book on her vegetarian recipes and a range of Linda McCartney's vegetarian foods became a new line at major supermarkets.

Short after the marriage Paul and Linda went veggie and from then on McCartney was determined never ever to kill any animal on their charge. Moreover they still kept sending campaigns for the animals right, giving money to the League Agianst the Cruel Sorts, etc.

Mary was born at 1:30 a.m. on Thursday, 29 August 1969, at the Avenue Clinic, St John's Wood, although an earlier announcement had said she was due in December. She weighed 6lbs 8ozs and arrived slightly less than six months after the couple had wed. Stella born in London on 12 September 1971 at the King's College Hospital of London and James Louis was born London on 12 September 1977.

In January 1980 paul and Linda would spend the only night in their whole marriage apart from each other. paul was arrested on the charge of trying to introduce 219 grames of marijuana of high quality in Japan. Meanwhile Paiul spent the night in jail, Linda was lodged with her children in the luxury suite of 500 pounds a night of the "Okura" Hotel. They didn't allow her to see Paul. He was finally rleased. However, they seemed not to have enough: four years later, during some holidays in Barbados, Paul and Linda were arrested and had to pay a fine of 200 dollars each for possessing cannabis. Linda was searched at Customs on their way back to England. They found a little amount of cannabis, so she was accussed and fined again.

However, the couple soon got tired of that, leading an example life with their children and forming the best and most estable couple in show business. But in 1995 something serious took place. In spite of his vegetarian diet and her healthy life, Linda was diagnopsed wioth a breast cancer and in December the announcement was made official.

She started being treated with quimotherapy and even she underwent surgery. For some time she looked absolutely recovered and started being seen publicly with his husband. The last of this public appearances was at the debut of daughter Stella as Chloe designer.

However, the canver had spread over to the liver and on 17 April 1998 she died in a farm the McCartneys owned in Arizona and not in Santa Barbara as initially had been told.

Linda was 56 years old. paul was with her all the time, he swayed her softly while she died and didn't stop talking to her. paul brought the ashes to Great Britain and, fulfilling Linda's wishes, he spread them through the building they lived in England.

According to Yoko's speaker, she was in shock. Ringo and George also made public their grief for the death of this great woman, example of strength and vitality. The threee Beatles could be seen together at the ceremony held in her honour where they sang "Let it be".

Now she left her children. Mary is a photographer and she exhibits at several galleries. Stella is, as everybody knows, a fashion designer and her designs had been nodelled by the best top models in the world such as Naomi Campbell. James studies architecture and has inherited the music skills from his father. Heather, adopted as his own child by Paul, is a painter and she has also exhibited her works in several cities.

"No more lonely nights" or "My love" are two of the many songs Paul dedicated to his wife all along his career.