Locals recall Beatle

Friday, Nov. 30, 2001 | 10:52 a.m.

After the Beatles appeared on the "Ed Sullivan Show" on Feb. 9, 1964, Las Vegas comedic mainstay Steve Rossi took George Harrison to dinner at La Camelia Restaurant in New York.

When Harrison and Rossi had performed at CBS studios earlier, 10,000 screaming teenagers gathered at the 52nd Street entrance. But at La Camelia -- owned by young mobster John Gotti -- Harrison, wearing a cap for a disguise and detached from the other Beatles, was not recognized or disturbed.

"George was a very nice guy who initially did not know how to deal with his fame," said Rossi, who headlined with partner Marty Allen on the program in which the Beatles made their American debut and stole the show.

"George was in the dressing room next to mine for the Sullivan show, and I told him, 'You guys are going to be a sensation.' He said he never had expected such a response because their first record, 'I Wanna Hold Your Hand,' was not yet that big in America."

After the Beatles made their sensational debut, Allen walked on stage and said: "Hello dere -- I'm Ringo's mother." Rossi sang "I Wanna Hold Your Hand" and both got big laughs. "If we had tried to do our regular routine after the Beatles had performed, it would not have worked," Rossi said.

Allen and Rossi, who performed on all three Sullivan shows on which the Beatles appeared, were performing at the Sands when the Beatles came to Las Vegas in August 1964 for the Fab Four's only concert at the Convention Center.

"There was an absolute frenzy surrounding their arrival at McCarran Airport and at the Sahara Hotel," said Myram Borders, who covered the event for United Press International. "There was such squealing at the Convention Center, you could hardly hear the music.

"They stirred up the community like no one had before, and at the time they were bigger than any other major entertainer who had come here, including Elvis Presley."

Don Payne, head of the Las Vegas News Bureau at the time, said: "I am sad about George's passing because it makes us realize they are not kids anymore. John Lennon has been dead 20 years and Ringo Starr and Paul McCartney are around 60. George was 58. We are seeing the aging of icons."

Brian O'Shea, who as a singer in the early 1960s had records produced by George Martin -- the Beatles' producer -- remembered his friend Harrision as every bit the "quiet one" by which he was known.

"George, I feel, was relieved when the Beatles broke up because he never enjoyed the pressure that was on the group," said O'Shea, a Las Vegas resident of 20 years who now works locally as a trombonist.

"If it was up to George, he would have locked himself away in a room and wrote songs all day. He was really a hermit at heart."

Harrison's death also reminded Rossi that time marches on.

"I experienced something similar watching the Mills Brothers die one by one, and now, at age 69, I'm seeing the same thing happen with the Beatles," Rossi a local resident since 1950, said.

"They all still seem so young, but now half of them are gone. What we can take to heart is that George's music and the music of all of the Beatles will live on forever."