Between July 7, 1940 and February 25, 1943, the Fab Four were born into this world.

1956 - John Lennon gets his first guitar and forms his first group.

1957 - John Lennon and Paul McCartney meet and Paul joins John's group.

1958 - Paul brings George Harrison into the group, the Quarrymen.

1960 - The Beatles band is launched with Stu Sutcliffe and Pete Bass onboard.

1961 - The Beatles are signed with manager Brian Epstein.

1962 - The first time the Beatles debut on the radio. Stu dies of a brain hemorrahage. Auditions for EMI Records take place and Pete Best is replaced with Ringo Starr. They record their first album.

1963 - The Beatles first single is released in America - "I Want to Hold Your Hand."

February 7, 1964 - The Beatles land in America and two days later appear on the Ed Sullivan Show before touring the country. Many hits surface, including She Loves You, Can't Buy Me Love, Love Me Do, I Feel Fine and A Hard Day's Night.

January 30, 1969 - The Beatles perform for the last time as a group on the rooftop of the Apple building. (See the video on this page).

1970 - Paul McCartney leaves the band.

1980 - John Lennon is assasinated.

1988 - The Beatles are inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

2001 - George Harrison dies from cancer.

Did Paul McCartney Really Die?!

This hoax was announced by a radio DJ in Detroit, Michigan. Some say the band and their executive management team even played a hand in helping the rumor catch fire.

The why is more important than the who. Some say Paul McCartney really did die, while others claim John Lennon was jealous and started the rumor as "wishful thinking."

Russell Gibb was the DJ who channeled the information to the public, claiming that the proof was in the albums' songs and artwork.

He supposedly died in a car accident at 5 A.M. one morning and the Beatles launched a cover up. A contest for a look-alike was held and no one ever announced a winner.

A man named William Campbell won and secretly replaced Paul, which is evident by the minor scar above his lip.

Are the Beatles Songs About Drugs?

Some are supposedly, yes. Such as Help! Which was written when John Lennon experimented with LSD. Others, like Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds isn't about LSD, but about a drawing Lennon's son, Julian, brought home from nursery school.

Being known as the "cute Beatle," James Paul McCartney was born in Liverpool England on June 18th, 1942 as son to father James and mother Mary McCartney.

Paul's mother, whom he was very close to, was a midwife, a skill that she learned while working as a nurse in the Maternity Ward at the same hospital that her son Paul was born in, Walton General Hospital in Liverpool. His father worked during the day for A. Hannay Co. as a cotton salesman, and then as a jazz musician with Jim Mac's Jazz Band at night.

At school, Paul was an exceptional student. After breezing through primary school and junior school with flying colors, he passed a test called the 11-plus exam, which got him into a sort of elite type of high school known as the Liverpool Institute. This is where he first met his band mate and friend, George Harrison.

In 1955, when he was just 14, Paul's mother died tragically from breast cancer, after suffering an embolism, likely due to a post mastectomy operation to stop the spread of her cancer. This incident greatly affected him, and was a large aspect of the bond that he and John Lennon, who also lost his mother at a young age, formed.

Musically, Paul started out on the trumpet, probably due to the fact that his father would often take him to local brass band concerts to expose him to music. He quickly traded the trumpet for an acoustic guitar however after a style of music called Skiffle became popular.

Skiffle music was a type of music that combined an influence of both folksy and bluesy styles. It was an interesting music that combined conventional instruments like the acoustic guitar and piano with unique object such as the washboard, the comb, a musical saw, etc.

Paul found that playing his first acoustic guitar was nearly impossible being a lefty, until he saw a poster of a famous musician of that time playing left handed with the strings being strung the opposite way.

At 15, Paul met John Lennon, who was actually playing in his own little Skiffle band called the Quarrymen. The two were introduced through a mutual friend named Ivan Vaughan.

McCartney apparently left an impression on the group after teaching them how to tune a guitar and showcasing his talents through a couple of songs because two weeks later the group invited Paul into the band.

Not long after, the Quarrymen were practicing in Paul McCartney's living room. This shows the support that Jim McCartney had of his son, even though at the time he didn't much care for the fact that Paul was hanging out with the apparently troublesome Lennon.

Through an endless stream of band member changes as well as name changes, eventually George Harrison was brought into the band on guitar, Paul moved from guitar to bass, and the Quarrymen became the Beatles. Not long after, the guy usually known as "the fifth Beatle" Pete Best was asked to leave and in came Ringo Starr - and the rest was history.