Wanted: The five girls who played truant for a day with the Fab Four in Knole
When Beatlemania hit Sevenoaks on a grey winter's day in 1967 – a story which has been well covered by this newspaper – five local girls were given a ringside seat while the filming of the first ever pop video took place in Knole Park.
One of the girls had discovered the best-kept secret of the century. John, Paul, George and Ringo were to film a sequence at a special location in the park to accompany the release of their forthcoming single, Strawberry Fields/Penny Lane.
She told four of her friends who all played truant and searched the park. They came out of the woods into a clearing and there were the Fab Four climbing out of a black Rolls Royce followed, in other cars, by a team of technicians.
The girls were invited to stay, given autographs and made to promise they wouldn't tell their friends. The Chronicle later spoke to the five truants, who wore headscarves so they should not be recognised, and then begged us not to print their surnames. One of them said: "None of us have ever had such a wonderful thing happen, but we should have been at school."
To this day I don't know the names of the five lucky girls who had the Beatles to themselves for the duration of that day's filming.
Source: Seven Oaks Chronicle
