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The Day John Lennon Died: A Look Back at the Tragic Events of His Murder

John LennonBrian Hamill, Getty Images

Every Beatles fan who was old enough to watch the news in 1980 remembers the sickening feeling. The murder of John Lennon took a beloved rock star and willing cultural divining rod from his devoted following. It took a newly maturing 40-year-old man from his wife and two sons.

John Lennon's murder also took an enthusiastic adopted New Yorker from the city he had come to love as his own. That's the approach author Keith Elliot Greenberg took for his new book, 'December 8, 1980: The Day John Lennon Died.'

"I'm not a Beatles scholar, by any means," Greenberg tells Spinner, though he nevertheless does an admirable job of portraying the key moments and relationships in Lennon's life that led to his contented, newly refreshed frame of mind on the eve of his murder. "I am a crime reporter, and a New Yorker. I felt I had the ability to tell the story in true-crime fashion, as well as the passion to convey what life was like in New York in 1980."

John Lennon and Yoko OnoDavid Mcgough, DMI / Time Life Pictures / Getty Images

Drawing on interviews with participants including a responding police officer, former Mayor Ed Koch and a city official who lived in the Dakota apartment building on Manhattan's Upper West Side, where Lennon lived and died, Greenberg examines the circumstances surrounding the last day of the singer's life. While Lennon, Yoko Ono and their young son, Sean, were growing more comfortable by the day with the endless interactions of New Yorkers, Mark David Chapman, a onetime fanatical Lennon follower, was plotting his senseless murder.

"It was most important to me to create context," says Greenberg -- "what New York and John Lennon were like in 1980."

As Lennon and Ono returned to their apartment from an evening recording session, Chapman, who had been lingering on the block for days, emerged from the Dakota's archway to shoot the former Beatle in the back. Though Lennon had been in the habit of addressing his own mortality -- on the day of his murder, he'd told a visiting interviewer that he hoped to die before Yoko -- the author is careful not to read too much into it.

"I think John was always referring to his own mortality," he says, pointing out that Lennon lost several people close to him, including his mother, onetime bandmate Stu Sutcliffe and Beatles manager Brian Epstein, during his short lifetime. "If you looked at a transcript of my conversations, you might say the same thing about me."

John and Yoko's life together, and Yoko's grief over the death of her husband, have been covered extensively, acknowledges the author. "I wanted to work the story along the margins. I wanted to tell the little stories in addition to the big story. To me, they add richness to the bigger tale."

Watch John Lennon's 'Watching the Wheels' Video


Greenberg, a native New Yorker who who was born in the Bronx, raised in Queens and currently lives with his family in Brooklyn, once worked in television for Geraldo Rivera, a friend of the ex-Beatle and his wife. The author was a teenager in the late '70s, when John and Yoko were celebrated (and sometimes hounded) by the New York media.

"John Lennon made me proud to be a New Yorker," he says. Unlike some public figures, Lennon accepted the city on its own terms. Sadly, that's what killed him.

The fact that Yoko Ono did not flee -- she still lives in the Dakota -- is a tribute to the city's resilience, Greenberg says.

"She has enhanced the city by contributing a million dollars to build Strawberry Fields. She made New York a more beautiful, serene, positive place."

Imagine that.


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drkchiropractor

Clecage, he was a HUMAN BEING I am watching a program about his life and he says that he didn't want to tour when his second son was born, because he had missed so much of his first sons life d.t. travel related to his profession......so don't hate him. Love him as a person, because that's what he was a person, not a god.

December 25 2012 at 12:55 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
drkchiropractor

We love you John and we ALWAYS WILL!! I will never forget that day......I was 20 years old and working a temp job, and when I heard the news on break I just couldn't go back to work... I quit. He was a great soul a great person. God Bless him and his family.....

December 25 2012 at 12:52 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Bubbie Needham

God Bless Him

December 08 2012 at 12:47 AM Report abuse +1 rate up rate down Reply
clecage

I used to like this guy until he died when it was revealed that he totally forgot his 1st child (who never saw his father when being raised) and to be forgotten by John in the will. All monies going to John's new family who did not suffer because John already was wealthy at that point. Jon is the biggest hypocrite that I have ever known. .... Love only some not all.

December 09 2010 at 10:24 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
lenono

Oh so Jesus goes around killing people because they said they are more popular than him? So in other words Jesus is a murderer.Dosen't that break the first comandment?Do you have any more brilliant statements?

December 08 2010 at 9:49 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
EmIly

I'm only 30 years old and Lennon died later in the year I was born. I don't know the man and neither did any of you. I'm saddened by the inhuman remarks I have just read by many of you. It's a shame that their is such judgement on this. By any means did I interpret this to be anymore news worthy than our American men and women fighting our wars. This is about remembering a man, whom touched millions all over the world. So what I'd he did drugs. That doesn't change him from what he was as a person. Ignorance from people like you will NEVER take the spotlight from those that deserve it. R.I.P Mr. Lennon, one day I hope to meet you on the other side.

December 08 2010 at 9:46 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
NANCY517

Wow so much hate and anger that I'm reading on this site alone.What is wrong with the world?I am so scared for my children to even go out to the mall or get a hamburger you have to live life but you never know anymore when the next gunman has decided to open fire and take lives with him.When did it all start how will it end if it ever does?I read about a six year old who hung himself he was being teased at school and picked on.How can it be that bad that a six year old see's no other way out than to take his own life because he was being picked on?I'm really scared for my children and my grandson for I can no longer protect them when they walk out the door.May the Lord watch over them and keep them safe.RIP John Lennon............

December 08 2010 at 6:46 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Benwa

Semper Fi, Stinky. Let's keep fighting for our Marines, Troopers, Sailors, Airmen and Coast Guardsmen. Without them, we would be in big doo-doo. Not sure if John (Lenin) Lennon ever appreciated that.

December 08 2010 at 5:08 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
wolfman

john lennon was a human being just like everyone else,but what made him special was the way he used his talent and popularity to make people think "IMAGINE" noone said his death was more important than pearl or 911 or our troops.if the world thought the way he did maybe we wouldn't need troops and we COULD live as one! but i'm just an "old hippy goofball" what do i know? PEACE!!!

December 08 2010 at 4:50 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
brianpape1

Can't believe that so much is being written about so little.
Harbinger of peace? Don't think so. What specifically did he do or say except a song. Make that piece and you get the image of he and a harpy in bed ripping one off.
Humanitarian? How? where? - multimillionaires can afford to be kind, but where is it written - especially after years of adulation and outright marketing by a truly untalented haridian.
Remembered? Yes, for sure, but for what? And what is he rightly remembered for - part of a group - nothing more - give me Ringo, John and Paul any day.

December 08 2010 at 4:45 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply