Feb. 11, 1965 - Maureen Cox, an 18-year-old hairdresser, and Richard Starkey, a 24-year-old musician, were married at a London Registrar’s Office today, and a sigh could be heard throughout England.
Mr. Starkey, better known as Ringo Starr, is the oldest, smallest, and perhaps most popular of the Beatles.
The wedding took place at 8:15 a.m. at Caxton Hall, Westminster. John Lennon described it in typically terse Beatle-talk:
“It was very early, and we all felt a bit ill, except Ringo. He looked extremely well. He kept going because he was getting married.
“Ringo wore a lightish gray tweedy kind of suit with the pants sort of raised up in the front and the jacket sort of dropped down in the back.
“He had a white carnation, and so did [Beatles manager] Brian Epstein. Nobody got us any. We were going to wear radishes, actually.
“Maureen had on an off-white suit of lacy wool, and her hair was up and done in a sort of string bag in the back. It looked good, actually. She had orchids.
“Some fellow said, ‘Are you Richard Starkey, and are you Maureen Cox?’ And they said yes, and I clapped at the end.
“Nobody cried. We’d threatened Mrs. Starkey that if she did, she wouldn’t be one of the gang. Then we all signed the register and went off to breakfast.”
Later, 31-year-old Brian Epstein talked about Ringo’s decision to marry at the very peak of his fantastic popularity.
“I was a little stunned, I must admit, when Ringo told me,” Epstein said.
He added: “I know a lot of kids are going to be upset and disappointed. But I don’t think Ringo’s appeal was just in being a bachelor.”
The wedding may have been a well-kept secret, but tonight scores of fans were gathering outside the house of a lawyer friend in Hove, Sussex, where Ringo and Maureen are spending their honeymoon.
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