A tie worn by John Lennon during the Beatles' Cavern Club era has sold at auction.
The tie hammered for £3,627 ($5,626), according to the Liverpool Echo, beating its £2,500 high estimate by 45.1% at the 22nd Annual Liverpool Beatles Auction, on August 24.
 Too hot for a tie. The Cavern Club was known for its close conditions. |
Lennon gave consignor Joyce McWilliams the tie in 1962, when as a 15-year-old, she attended a Beatles lunchtime concert at Liverpool's Cavern Club.
"The Beatles were recording some numbers and I was sitting on the edge of the stage holding the microphone stand," recalls McWilliams.
"It was very hot in the club and John asked me to lend him a handkerchief to mop his brow with.
"He handed it back to me, and loosened his tie when I said: 'I thought you were going to give me your tie,' and he just handed it to me."
Lennon-worn items have a history of performing well at auction.
A Sgt. Pepper style jacket, thought to have been worn by Lennon in the late 1960s, sold last week for a hammer price of £6,900 ($10,813), while a jacket that Lennon wore for a 1966 LIFE magazine shoot made $240,000 in 2011.
The tie was not the most valuable item of the auction, however. That accolade went to a copy of school textbook Thomas Pickles' The British Isles, signed twice by Lennon in 1956 at the Quarry Bank School. It hammered for £8,658 ($13,431).
Paul Fraser Collectibles has a stunning range of Beatles memorabilia for sale, including this striking Lennon-signed photograph.
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