by Mike O'Reilly

Created on: February 08, 2009   Last Updated: February 12, 2009

It is hard to believe, but The Beatles came to America 45 years ago. We've all seen the footage of their arrival at JFK, the huge crowds of teenage girls surrounding their hotel, and of course, their first appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show. They say that 1 in 3 television sets that cold February night was tuned to watch the Fab Four's debut, and the world was never the same after that appearance. The next day, every teenage girl wanted to marry one of them, and every teenage boy wanted to BE one of them. They were new, exciting, different and they spoke to millions through their music, personality and appearance. If you look at those early appearances now, their hair doesn't really appear very long, but back then, when whiffles or crew cuts were the rage, they looked strange, especially to older viewers. I'll never forget my Dad, watching with my Mother, two brothers, my sister and I, declaring to no one in particular, "look at the hair on those guys, you can't tell if they're boys or girls!" I remember thinking at the time (I was 11), "you could if they pulled down their pants Dad, except for Ringo" but I said nothing, because I didn't want him to slug me, and my plan was to eventually replace one of The Beatles. Again, I was eleven years old, and thought this was possible.

The first step was to buy a BEATLE WIG, which was impossible to find for a couple of days, and then they were EVERYWHERE. My buddies and I went to a neighborhood store, Mike's Variety, and we each purchased one for 99 cents. We rushed back to my house, took the wigs out of the plastic packaging and put them on our heads. Talk about disappointment. We didn't look like The Beatles, we looked like munchkin versions of Moe from the Three Stooges. My buddy Kevin thought, maybe if we comb them, the hair will loosen up and look more natural. Bad idea. Clumps of simulated hair fibers came off in the comb. I told Kevin, turn the wig around and nobody will notice. He put his back on his head, we put ours on, and we all attempted to recreate The Beatles woooo' while shaking our heads. More pieces of hair fell out and onto the floor. Where the heck did they make these things, Chernobyl? After only five minutes, my bedroom resembled the floor at Bruno's Barber Shop, but without that Lucky Strike/Aqua Velva smell. We were mad, we had been ripped off and we were going to get our money back! We took our wigs, or what was left of them, and stormed into Mike's Variety. "These wigs stink!" we bellowed with authority. "We want our money back!" From behind the counter, Mike, who was pushing fifty and was well over six feet tall, looked down at us and with a smile, said "Sorry guys. All sales are final! Now scram." We looked at each other, dropped the wigs, and bolted out the door. The following week, we went back to Mike's, and when he wasn't looking, put a bunch of Hershey bars and some gum in our pockets, and left without paying. Justice had been served.

Sadly, none of us ever replaced any of The Beatles.

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