Four Americans on what it felt like to be swept up in Beatlemania, and reflecting on the band’s impact on their lives
What Janet DiGangi recalls most vividly about the day the Beatles came to town is eating cake and ice-cream with furious impatience. It was 12 September 1964, and DiGangi was 12, living in Boston, Massachusetts, the oldest of seven siblings. The Beatles were about to play Boston Garden but the family couldn’t leave until they’d celebrated her brother Peter’s second birthday with candles and presents.
“I was furious, because I didn’t want to be late,” recalls DiGangi, now 72. She had saved up all her babysitting money to buy the band’s second US album, Meet the Beatles! “I was so excited.” Thankfully, DiGangi made it to the show on time. It was “electric”, and sent fans wild. “It was just an explosion of screaming and hysteria,” she says.
