Why There Were No Plans To Segregate The Beatles’ 1964 Jacksonville Concert

        This post revises our knowledge of the Beatles and segregation during their 1964 US tour. The Beatles were unintentionally misled into believing there were plans to segregate their Jacksonville Gator Bowl concert scheduled for September 11, 1964 on their US tour. Although protests about this supposed plan by John, Paul, George and Ringo were sincere and praiseworthy, the Fab Four were opposing a phantom, a rumour with no basis in fact. The moptops were guided by journalists looking for controversial copy towards giving validity to a story that was never true. Furthermore, the controversy has had the unintended but unfortunate effect of giving the Beatles credit for a desegregation that was actually achieved through the efforts of African-Americans, whose achievement has been erased by the focus on the Beatles.

           In reality, on December 7, 1960, Jacksonville-based federal judge Bryan Simpson had issued a permanent injunction prohibiting the city from operating or leasing public recreational facilities on a discriminatory basis.[1] This came into effect on January 9, 1961, included the Gator Bowl, and provided for “contempt of court citations for city officials or employees who do not comply.”[2] The background to the injunction is that a group of African-Americans, led by Frank Hampton, sued the city when they were denied access to two city golf courses on the same day as whites.[3] When Judge Simpson found in their favour, the city sold the courses with a proviso that they remained segregated, a strategy that was quashed by the Florida Supreme Court in 1962.[4] When Hampton et al and their attorney, Ernest Jackson, heard of the plan to sell the courses, they decided to sue to desegregate all facilities that were still operated by the city.[5]

         There were other signs of segregation that the Beatles encountered in 1964 that may have led them to see the Gator Bowl as a venue likely to be segregated. Firstly, at the time Brian Epstein signed the concert contract, Jacksonville’s hotels were still segregated and anyone who attempted to cross that line faced being fined.[6] The Beatles seem to have been aware that they were denied hotel accommodation in Jacksonville (on the grounds that they had two black support acts) and this could easily have led them to believe a rumour that the Gator Bowl would be segregated. Secondly, plans to hold a Beatles concert in Montgomery, Alabama, just a day or two after Jacksonville, were abandoned because Epstein was informed that segregation was still being applied to concerts there prior to the Civil Rights Act being passed on July 2, 1964.[7] 

        However, some blame could perhaps be attached to journalists for not checking the legal reality in August-September 1964. It is plausible that journalists traveling with the Beatles had a vested interest in inflating rumours to create stories that could run for several days rather than investigating them and running the risk of killing the stories. This is shown by how the tour was vulnerable to other false rumours, as shown by the mistaken belief that Jeane Dixon had predicted the group’s deaths in a plane crash, a claim which Dixon had denied in March.[8] There was also a persistent story, first spread by Walter Winchell in March 1964, that Paul McCartney had secretly married Jane Asher, which he repeatedly had to deny. We need therefore to look into the deeper cultural and media forces at work around reporting of Beatles stories and how that has created misconceptions that persist over time.

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[1] Hampton v. City of Jacksonville, No. 4368-Civ-J, December 7, 1960, cited in  Cason v. City of Jacksonville, 497 F.2d 949 (5th Cir. 1974), online at: https://law.resource.org/pub/us/case/reporter/F2/497/497.F2d.949.73-3102.html

[2] The Call (Kansas City, Missouri), January 20, 1961. Chattanooga Daily Times, January 7, 1961.

[3] Frank Hampton, Edward Joseph Norman, et al v. the City of Jacksonville, et al. 1958 Case No. 4073-Civ-J, referenced at https://www.archives.gov/atlanta/finding-aids/civil-liberties-cases.html#fl

[4] Frank Hampton et al., Appellants, v. City of Jacksonville, Florida, et al., Appellees, 304 F.2d 320 (5th Cir. 1962), online at https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/F2/304/320/363291/

[5] Interview with Frank Hampton, October 10, 1975, University of Florida Digital Collections. Interview with Ernest Jackson, October 30, 1976, Samuel Proctor Oral History Program, Department of History, University of Florida, accessed at University of Florida Digital Collections.

[6] Tampa Tribune, February 21, 1964

[7] Montgomery Advertiser, July 1, 1964.

[8] San Francisco Examiner, March 26, 1964. Benton Harbour News-Palladium, June 18, 1964.