CANDLESTICK PARK 1966: ORAL HISTORY FROM FANS

The Beatles play at Candlestick on Aug. 29, 1966. (Chronicle file)

Last month, The Big Event and the San Francisco Chronicle started searching for readers who went to the Aug. 29, 1966, The Beatles show at Candlestick Park. The concert, the last commercial show for the Beatles, is arguably the most famous musical event in Bay Area history.

More than three dozen came forward, many with heartfelt and funny stories. Some are returning to see Paul’s Farewell to Candlestick event at Candlestick this Thursday.

Aidin Vaziri, editor Sue Adolphson and I put together a very cool package in today’s Sunday Datebook about the 1966 show, filling the Pink section with trivia, a set list, images by rock photographer Jim Marshall and memories from several fans who were there.
Below is a longer oral history of the event with more of their words and less of mine.

(All were young Beatles fans at the time of the show, unless specified otherwise.)

The Beatles show was announced early in the summer — the band’s first appearance in the Bay Area since a 1965 appearance at the Cow Palace. The Candlestick show was the end of a controversial tour that included John Lennon’s famous “more popular than Jesus” remark. Fans had no idea at the time, but it was the last commercial show the band would perform together.

SUSAN KOOP: I was a newly minted teen and had been crazy out of my mind about the Beatles since 1964. By 1966 I’d carved John’s name with a buck knife in my mother’s antique desk and sent away $2 to Clearasil without the two required boxtops explaining in a note that I was too young to have zits yet but would still treasure the faux-canvas portrait of the Beatles they were selling. They sent me one.

NANCY SITTON: On August 11, 1966, I correctly identified the song being played on KYA as “Love You To,” thus winning two tickets to The Beatles concert at Candlestick. Being only 14 at the time, my mother said I couldn’t go unless I got two more tickets so that my older sister and her husband could take me and my younger brother. So the next day KYA played “Till There Was You” and I had my brother call and win two more tickets. …

JOE NESBITT: A new friend and I bought our $5.00 tickets (I don’t remember where we got them in that pre-Ticketron era), and rode the Greyhound bus from Monterey to downtown San Francisco. We took a Yellow cab from Market Street out to the ‘Stick; the fare was $3 plus a 50 cent tip.

Terry Dilbeck’s unused Beatles ticket.(P:Brant Ward/The Chronicle)

ANN MONSON: I was 13 years old and a huge Beatles fan. My best friend and I saved up and purchased tickets with a face value of $6.50 which allowed us to be in the third row directly above the dugout as they entered the field. My mother drove us from Sacramento; she bought a ticket at the gate so she wouldn’t interfere with our 13-year-old enthusiasm.

DAN ORTH: I had just graduated from Piedmont High School and then turned 18 on July 27, 1966. The original girl I was planning to take to the concert told me about 48 hours beforehand she wouldn’t be able to go.I told my parents who then told our very nice neighbors up the street on Lexford Road. Our neighbors then contacted their very beautiful, debutante-like niece, my age, who did go to the concert with me. She had attended another high school in the Bay Area …

MAUREEN PRICE: I had been possessed by the Beatles since that night when they appeared on the Ed Sullivan show. My dad knew that this was the ultimate gift for his 13 year old daughter. So he scored a ticket from the butcher – one ticket. For me. I don’t know why he didn’t get two and come with me but he didn’t. He drove me there though and dutifully waited in the parking lot until the concert was over.

NORMAN MASLOV: I’m a third generation San Franciscan and like many my age, got sucked into the Beatles after seeing them on the Ed Sullivan Show. I was a bit too young for their first Cow Palace shows but I always figured I would seen them eventually …

One one monday afternoon, August 29th, 1966, my friend Dany Walker rang our doorbell at around 4:30 PM. Dany was the lead singer in our band and his father was George Walker, a San Francisco criminal attorney. He had given Dany two tickets to see that Beatles that night. One would be mine if my parents would drive us to the Stick. I so vividly remember asking my mother if I could go and her reply still reverberates to this day, “ sorry but you have a drum lesson tonight, if we cancel it in less than 24 hours, we have to pay for it. You can go next year.”

That show at Candlestick Park was their last ever concert. The Beatles never toured again. I no longer play the drums. My mother is no longer living.

ELLIE SEGAL: In the summer of 1966 I was a starving intern at Kaiser Hospital, and every morning I would dial into the local radio station for their giveaway of 2 tickets to the final Beatles concert. One day, I was the 12th and winning caller and was absolutely thrilled. But, sad to say, I developed a fever of 104 degrees and was hospitalized the day before the concert. So I gave my tickets to a fellow intern and another friend, who went to the concert and bought me a Beatles record album as a thank you (I still have it).

DOMONIC SIGILLO: (I was) born in The City and worked at the ‘Stick for many years. The night the Beatles were to play my older brother Joe said we should go out and work it. I told him “You go,” because I was low on the totem pole and would get either cold soda or hot coffee to vend. Little did anyone know this was to be the last time they would play together.

I did see them later on when they played at the Cow Palace but never all of them together. I have always regretted not going out that night to the ‘Stick.

Beatles fans at Candlestick Park in 1966 (AP photo/ Fred Pardini)

CYNTHIA STEINBERG: When I started bugging my parents to buy me a ticket to the Beatles concert, they gave me a choice: I could either spend two fun filled weeks away at Girl Scouts camp, or just a single evening at some concert that I’ll probably never remember the name of the band, or why I liked them.

Yes, I made the worst boneheaded decision of my life, and spent two miserable weeks at camp, and have been regretful ever since. On the bright side, this tale gave my daughters hours of laughs and teasing.

SUSAN KOOP: My brother Jerry suggested that we stay awake and try late at night when the call volume was bound to be down. The first night we tried from midnight to 5 a.m. without luck. The second night I lasted until around 3 a.m before passing out cold on my bed. I was awakened by Jerry leaping and screaming that he’d won by getting through and picking John’s name. …

I was beyond ecstatic. Then Jerry broke it to me that our partnership had dissolved the minute I went to sleep and that the tickets were now his and that he planned on taking his new girlfriend. And that’s exactly what he did.

Fans went with friends, cousins, dates and very patient parents. One reader got to see The Beatles first-hand.

JACKIE BANGO: I can remember that night as if it were last week. We planned for weeks what we were going to wear and how we would get to Candlestick Park. We took a Muni bus from North Beach as my Aunt and Uncle followed us in their car. They had seats in another area of the park. My mom made us chicken soup knowing that it might help calm our anxious stomachs! I don’t think anything could help to calm us.

ANDREA CAMPOS: I was there with my cousins. We were 12,13,14,15 years old and took the bus from North Beach to the concert. It was a Beatles Special bus!

JEANNE BROWN: There was a lot of traffic on the approach on 101. Along side the bay with Candlestick in sight, the car broke down. We were all out of the car with Sue and myself in a state of panic. A car load of teenagers pulled over and offered to give us a ride. My uncle and dad seemed happy to let us go with these strangers so off we went. I don’t think that would have happened if our moms had been there. …

GUS THAM: I was one of the batboys and my brother a clubhouse attendant for the Giants that season, and the Beatles used the visiting team clubhouse as their dressing room prior to the show. All of us, myself, my brother Brad, and several of the other batboys, spent the afternoon prepping the room for their arrival, and then were shuffled out, with the promise of a quick photo op before the show.

Gus Tham, Ringo Starr and siblings at the concert. (Photo: Jim Marhsall, courtesy Gus Tham)

GUS THAM: We had some good laughs with The Beatles, with Ringo being the most outgoing with us, getting programs signed by all four, and my sister getting a baseball signed by all four. There is actually quite an urban legend around how many baseballs The Beatles signed during that final stadium tour, and autographed Beatle baseballs from that tour are like the Holy Grail for collectors. …

I remember Joan Baez and a few others being there, but as the time of the show approached, it did start to get pretty crowded so it was time to get out and go find a spot to watch the show, which ended up being the visitors dugout, along the third baseline, safe and out of the way. …

Anticipation for the show was huge. But fans had to wait for a seemingly endless string of opening acts to finish.

JOE NESBITT: The support acts included The Remains, who I don’t remember at all, The Cyrkle, an American band managed by Brian Epstein with a dorky radio single called “Red Rubber Ball.” (There was also) Bobby Hebb, with his huge summertime hit, the classic “Sunny,” and the Ronettes, the only female act ever to tour with the Beatles — minus lead singer Ronnie Bennett, whose jealous future husband Phil Spector wouldn’t let her travel with the tour. Ronnie was replaced by cousin Elaine Mayes.

ANN MONSON: Looking at the photos it’s hard to believe how empty the stadium was. I do remember that Candlestick had only the stadium around the infield, the remainder of the stadium had not been built.

SARAH PIERCE: We had pretty good seats. But my mom brought binoculars just in case. We were the only folks with binoculars for rows and we were suddenly very popular.

NANCY SITTON: I still have two of the tickets: Gate A Section 21 Row 9 seats 17 & 18. They were nose bleed seats in upper bleachers on the first base line. It was typically cold and windy but I didn’t mind at all.

JIM NESBITT: The Beatles emerged from the Giants’ dugout and walked up the stairs to the high stage straddling second base. From my seat in the lower deck between 3rd base and home plate, I could clearly see everything onstage through binoculars. The Beatles wore matching dark green suits, white shirts with a bright green print design, and their famous Beatle boots, except for George Harrison, who, inexplicably, wore black loafers with white socks. …

The Beatles played on a platform behind second base.(P:Chronicle file)

JEANNE BROWN: When they finally got on the stage, no one in our section was screaming. Sue and I looked at each other and decided to get things started. We jumped and screamed for their 30 minutes on the stage.

JACKIE BANGO: When the Beatles stepped onto the stage there was that undeniable sound of Beatlemania, which we contributed to. We could hear them singing, but they didn’t sound as they did on their records.

ERNIE VASQUEZ: My seats were wonderful–right behind home plate. The Beatles started playing and I immediately started screaming just like all the other teenage girls. The truth is I did not really feel like screaming but I did scream all throughout the concert. …

The concert was short, the sound system was awful and the boys were not very personable. Even at that time, I knew the concert was not very good, but I also knew I had attended something very very special. Believe me when I say, if you put on a concert like that today, you would be laughed right out of the park.

JIM LUCAS: People say you couldn’t hear them. But that is rubbish. Not only could you hear them, they were spot on harmonically at a time before floor monitors and the high tech gadgetry groups perform with today.

DAN ORTH: The sound on this 3rd-base side of the stadium was not at all good. And the never-ending screaming and yelling of the girl Beatles fans drowned out the entire sound (singing and instruments) of the Beatles performance.And I’ll never forget how short the Beatles performance was.It clocked in at a very short 30 minutes or so.But I was very excited to just be there with the one-and-only Beatles! …

It is very interesting to note that I found out from a Facebook friend who attended this show, the sound was much,much better on the first-base side of Candlestick. This was because the winds of Candlestick this very historic evening blew towards the first-base side of the stadium. So the winds blew the bulk of and best sounds from the PA-Speakers to the first-base side. …

NANCY SITTON: From the notes I took after the concert:

“George was rather hoarse and sang “If I Needed Someone” too slowly. Rumored that in LA someone stepped on his foot with a spiked heel. Played guitar casually but well. John was very pale and weak in voice. He waved to the boys who climbed the center field fence and ran toward the stage. Barely heard him. Paul was great! He was always clowning and waving to the fans. His mike once went way down and he went down with it. Then he went back up with it. Said “It’s a bit chilly out here.” and “Sorry about the weather.” and “This is our last song. We want you to join in or whatever – clap or such with us.”

Sitton’s notes, written a day after the concert. (Courtesy Nancy Sitton)

Ira Bray was one of the “boys who climbed the center field fence.” He said the act wasn’t premeditated.

IRA BRAY: There was about thirty of us as best I can recollect. We could see the back of the bandstand setup on second base. All that was between us and that was the center field fence, guarded by three or so security men. We were grouped at the top of the hill, just below the scoreboard so we could see over the fence.

Once the Beatles came on and started playing a strange thing happened. The group started moving closer to the fence one section at a time, first the group on the left, then the group on the right, then the center group. It was the perfect maneuver to divide and conquer the three security guards. At some point, and I don’t remember exactly when or why, there was a charge towards the fence and guys started climbing over it. I couldn’t help myself, I darted up as well and quickly made it up and over and on to the field. The goal was right in front of us, make it to second base, sit down in front of the band and watch the concert, just like we were at Speedway Meadows in Golden Gate Park! …

Screaming teens, a quick show and lots of empty seats were three strong memories shared by fans. The concert lasted just 33 minutes.

MAUREEN PRICE: My seat was in the first row on the third base line. The Ronnettes warmed up the crowd and there was a trailer out on the pitching mound area where the stage was. Every time there was motion detected from inside the trailer screams would go up around the stadium. The Beatles were in there – waiting to come out! … I got as close as I possibly could – sitting above the dugout, feet dangling, waiting to catch the first glimpse of the first Beatle alighting from the trailer. It was almost time … the announcer was getting the crowd ready, all eyes on the trailer, decibel level rising … when … the Beatles walked out from below my feet! They had been in the dugout the whole time!

I almost jumped! … I hesitated … I thought again and then the moment passed. It was too late. They were too far now headed for the stage. My one chance at a fateful meeting with Paul gone. The concert was a blur of music, screaming, hysteria, crying. Exhilarating!

ELLIE SEGAL: They said the screaming from the teenagers in front of them was so loud they couldn’t hear a word being sung. They finally tapped one of the girls on the shoulder and asked whether she might want to hear what the Beatles were singing. She looked at them disdainfully and said “If I wanted to hear them I would buy their album.”

OLLIE WELCH: I was standing next to a “teenie-bopper.” A reporter asked her why she was sobbing, and she said, “Because I love Paul, and I can’t tell him.

IRA BRAY: I was escorted off the field by two officers. As they did so I felt a sudden rush of pride at having tried such an audacious act, heard the screaming from the stands and gave a lusty wave to those who I thought were cheering us on. Once off the field a discussion began between the officers. All I remember were the words, “… take him down to the
station …”

Terrible words to my ears, the thought of my Father getting a call to come bail his son out of jail was simply more than I could handle. Luckily, fathers themselves to teenagers I imagine, they saw the intended effect of the their words and instead gave me a gentle
push out the gate with a gruff, “Don’t try to come back in!”

The Beatles left the field in an armored truck. (Photo: Fred Pardini/AP)

JACKIE BANGO: They left the stage into the armored truck and left us crying and wanting more. Some in our group said the Beatles won’t be coming back. We had read how difficult it was for them to perform live.

JIM NESBITT: The show was briskly paced with a few droll comments from Lennon between songs as he and McCartney shared front man duties. The only bit of showmanship was when McCartney intro’d I Wanna Be Your Man and swung a boom mic around that locked into position in front of Ringo’s face just as he began singing. The 11 song set was over in half an hour, finishing with Long Tall Sally, and Lennon promising “We’ll see you next year!”

After the Beatles left, there was silence on the field, and chaos in the parking lot as thousands of teens (30 years before cell phones would become common) looked for their parents.

JACKIE BANGO: After such an emotional high, there was an eerie quiet and let down feeling now that it was over. My sister, Jeannie, remembers people handing out flyers promoting a new television show coming up. It was a show called “The Monkees”. How could they!

JEANNE BROWN: I don’t remember how we found our dads after the show but I do remember climbing an 8 foot cyclone fence in the rush. …

DENISE LEONETTI: There was a guy working on clean up that night that we went to school with. It was weird that we met up with him being as it was so big but we did. He told us that one gate was open for the cleaners to get in and we went in … and got all the cigarette butts on the stage and I took Paul McCartney’s amplifier cord. We touched the drums and everything. I’ll never forget that.
But alas, my dad told my older brother to clean up the basement. This was about 5 years later, and I had moved all my Beatles stuff to a box in the basement. Well, yeah, he threw it all out. I still tell the story to anyone who will listen.

DAN ORTH: I left thousands,probably tens of thousands of dollars on the concrete grounds of Candlestick Park that very historic night. … There were literally hundreds and hundreds of ticket stubs all around us on the grounds of Candlestick Park after the end of the concert.The bulk of the crowd had already left their seats and exited the stadium before my date and I left. So I very easily saw all this gold on the ground.

The reason I didn’t stoop down and help myself to a few hundred of these ticket stubs to place in the pockets of my clothes was because I felt embarrassed to do so in front of this very beautiful, very high-class girl. My very strong feelings about these Beatles Candlestick Park ticket stubs becoming very valuable collector’s items were exactly correct. My Facebook friend who also attended this show told me to look on Ebay to see the proof that these original good-condition stubs sell for $500-plus on today’s valuable collectibles market.

Several fans who write to the Chronicle are going to Paul McCartney’s concert this Thursday.

JIM LUCAS: To make things come full circle, I’m taking my son to the Paul McCartney concert at Candlestick in August (my son is a very accomplished musician), so the next generation is continuing in Candlestick concerts. While my taxes run to the ’65-’66 time frame, my son loves “Revolver” and “Sgt. Pepper’s.” One more thing for fathers and sons to argue about!

JEANNE BROWN: In 2012, my husband bought tickets to see Sir Paul at ATT Park. I made us both special tee shirts with a copy of my ticket stub from 1966. Yes, I have kept it all these years. Lots of people stopped to comment on the shirts. I’m attaching a photo of the ticket stub and the shirts. As for the price of tickets, well, you can see the difference!

Keith and Jeanne Brown in 2012. (Photo: Courtesy Jeanne Brown)

NORMAN MASLOV (The ex-drummer whose mother wouldn’t let him go): Aside from a few years in Menlo Park, Mill Valley and Daly City, San Francisco has been my home. I bought my home in the Inner Mission in 1991, raised my son Joseph there, but recently sold out to the techies this past winter and bought a home in Seattle for about a quarter the price. I still love San Francisco, but I was fortunate enough to spend fifty great years enjoying all she had to offer. I come back frequently for work and will be back again in August to see Paul McCartney perform at Candlestick Park. I felt it a fitting thing to do, seeing a Beatle closing down the venue where they played their final concert in the city I will always love.

This August circle will finally be complete.

JACKIE BANGO: We have seen him the various times he’s been in the Bay Area, but this time has a special meaning. Of course I can’t say the Beatles are back, but it is PAUL. The only missing piece for this fifty year saga is to meet Paul and to thank him for a lifetime of joy through his special gift of music.

CYNTHIA STEINBERG: But the worst, most painful part of this is that I lost my daughter last New Year’s Eve. Before she met her husband, she went to dozens of concerts with me, and by the time she hit middle school she knew every song and lyrics of the Beatles. It breaks my heart that we won’t be able to go to the last Candlestick concert to see Paul McCartney … I have no doubt that we’d be there along with my eight-year-old old grandson who’s known all the words for a few years now. Beatles songs were a huge influence in our family… I wish she was still here, singing along with every song.

SUSAN KOOP: My brother died a few years (after the 1966 concert) and only recently my mother pulled out his wallet from her closet for me to see. Low and behold, one of the Beatles tickets was in it preserved perfectly over the decades. I now have that framed ticket in my office and it reminds me fondly of my big brother and serves as a souvenir that much younger version of myself.

IRA BRAY: More recently reading and viewing documentaries about the concerts I came to understand that our stunt was not appreciated by the Beatles, that we in fact caused a small disruption in the concert. In an attempt at an apology I found Paul McCartney’s charity online auction for tickets to the last concert at Aid Still Required, made a donation and said that I was sorry for gate crashing and interrupting things.

MAUREEN PRICE: When I got back to the car my Dad had another surprise for me. He worked at Pan Am at the time and told me that he had been able to get permission for me to fly back to England on the plane with the Beatles that next day! I couldn’t wait to get home and talk to my mom. I had been trying to convince her to let me shave my legs and this recent development, I thought, obviously tipped the scale on my side of the argument. I mean, how could Paul fall in love with me if I still couldn’t even get permission to shave my own legs? I was determined … and I won. I strapped on my cinnamon tinted stockings and off we went.

My dad and I arrived at the airport only to find that the plane was not at the gate but out on the tarmac for security reasons – and I wasn’t going. Crushed! He immediately went to Plan B. He managed to convince the nice stewardess to bring home a souvenir for me and boy, did she! I still have the beautiful gold trimmed Pan Am dinner menu from that flight. And on the back … the autographs of all four of the Beatles.

Part of the Pan Am menu, signed by The Beatles. (Courtesy Maureen Price)

The show itself was not the greatest in San Francisco history, but witnesses still speak of it in mythical terms. Some fans have made “pilgrimages” to Liverpool.

JACKIE BANGO: Here we are 50 years after first hearing the Beatles and we finally kept a promise we made to each other. We always wanted to travel to England together to see all the Beatles sites. The limitations of adulthood — college, jobs, marriage, families — seemed to deter us. A year and a half ago my cousin Andrea decided it was the right time to make our childhood dream come true. This past June, Andrea, (sister) Jeannie and I visited London and Liverpool. We had a blast. The trip was more than I hoped it would be. Being in the Cavern Club and singing Beatles songs brought it all full circle.

NANCY SITTON: I’m now retired and living in Mountain View. I play only classical music (I play the double bass in 3 south bay community orchestras) but I still have a soft spot for Beatles music. One of the orchestras I perform with, The Redwood Symphony, will be playing with a Beatles cover band, The White Album, in September in a repeat of a very successful show we did last year.

ANN MONSON: When people talk about concerts they have been at I can always trump them, I was at the last concert performed by the Beatles. It was a big day in my life. …

GUS THAM: That evening has always stuck in all of our minds because it was just such an event. The fact that it turned out to be The Beatles last concert truly made it something even more special, but in a sense, it also represented a real beginning to many years of being close to music here in San Francisco. It was right after this that the whole scene exploded upon us, and it was just a great ride for decades after that.