George Harrison is pictured in the back seat of a car as he leaves the Hilton hotel in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, Feb 4, 1977. (National Archives, Anefo collection/Suyk, Koen)
If you happened to be inside a hospital early in the pandemic, you might have heard these words floating through the corridors The smiles returning to the faces. Little darling, it seems like years since it s been here. They re lyrics from Here Comes the Sun, George Harrison s 1969 classic about the resurrection from the dead of winter. Across the country, hospitals played The Beatles song over paging systems as a celebratory ritual when discharging a patient on the mend from the coronavirus. Many still do.
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Today, we celebrate what would have been George Harrison s 78th birthday. When it comes to such milestones, the mind easily wanders in the direction of other, less sanguine anniversaries. Incredibly, it has already been more than four decades, for instance, since December 8, 1980, the last day that all four Beatles walked the earth. And when it comes to George in particular, nearly two decades have elapsed since his untimely death in November 2001 at age 58.
In sharp contrast with Lennon s shocking murder in 1980, Harrison s passing could be considered less wrenching. In the late 1990s, he had undergone radiotherapy during a bout with throat cancer. While he had seemed to have beaten the disease at the time, reports began to circulate in the summer of 2001 that his recent medical condition was not merely serious, but dire, as a struggle with lung cancer had spread to his brain.