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[Allan Rock] The fact that we were Canada, that we were sort of -- as we've always been --
that middle ground between the old world, and the excess of America, made it an attractive place for him to be.
***
[John Lennon] So it seems that whatever we think about it, we keep coming back here, without even having to think. You know?
***
[Yoko Ono] I just remember that the people in Canada were so great. I mean, they were sending us such warm vibrations. And it was just beautiful.
It's just a very nice, warm memory.
And of course, you know, they were so good to us, that we probably wouldn't have been inspired to do all that like, "Give Peace a Chance," etcetera. You know?
***
[Narrator] Over the next week, they appeared in so many living rooms, it was hard to think of them as "dangerous."
***
[CBC WEEKEND]
[Lloyd Robertson] I'm Lloyd Robertson, and this is CBC Weekend.
John Lennon is here in Canada selling peace. He is here in our studio tonight ...
along with Yoko ...
and Rabbi Abraham Feinberg from Holy Blossom Temple.
John, you've been terribly flattering to Canada since you've been around this week. What is it about Canada? Why is this Peace Movement being held here?
[John Lennon] Canada is the first place that has given us something.
For instance, the media and the press treat us as human beings ...
[Rabbi Abraham Feinberg] Right.
[Yoko Ono] Yes.
[John Lennon] which is -- I'm astonished!
[Lloyd Robertson] I would like to know why you wouldn't choose a place where war is going on right now ...
or where there is a dispute in progress. Vietnam? The Middle East?
[John Lennon] A, because Canada chose us as much as we chose Canada. B, we had an offer to go to Biafra.
And then we have to consider the pros and cons of risssking -- I know it's a risk to go across the road -- but risking going through an area like that -- Biafra, Israel or Hanoi, whatever it is -- how much can we do aliiiive, or dead?! I don't want to be Mr. and Mrs. Dead Saint of 1970.
[Lloyd Robertson] [Interrupting Rabbi Feinberg's agreement with John] Rabbi Feinberg, you know, there were some comments made yesterday from people in this country about this being a naive project. And some Canadians say it's a waste of time. What's your feeling about that?
[Rabbi Abraham Feinberg] Quite the contrary. I think this project of the Pop Peace Festival is very realistic. Because it's intended to leap over the politicians and reach the people.
***
[John Brower] They risked their reputation. They risked their credibility for peace. They put everything on the line. They declared themselves to be for peace.
And that was not a popular theme in those days ...
with the Establishment.
***
[John Lennon] We want to make peace economically viable. And so therefore, if there's money in it, the Establishment will come along with it.
[Yoko Ono] Yes.
[John Lennon] Let them earn money out of it. Let them do what they like. But we don't believe there's such a generation gap. There are peace-lovers of all ages, and of all walks of life. We haven't particularly had more help from, say, hippies, or whatever, than we have from adults. Or like Rabbi Feinberg and people like that.
There are plenty of adults that are just as worried, and want to do just as much as the youth.
***
[Narrator] John and Yoko wanted no pandemonium this time.
So they chose to hide out on the country estate of singer Ronnie Hawkins.
***
[Ronnie Hawkins] I didn't know that much about the Beatles at the time. My world was brass knuckles and combat boots. And everybody was still, you know, ruining their livers.
[Laughs] You know, we didn't know nobody was into that love and peace in my crew down there. I mean, it's still, you know, rocking.
When they pulled in, I'm standing there, you know, waving, saying "Where's the Beatles? Where's John?"
And he opens the door and he says, "I'm going to give you 40 days to get back home."
And he knew all the words to every song, better than I did for some of them.
***
[Reporter] This is the house that Rock built. It belongs to romping Ronnie Hawkins.
It's in a sort of a secluded area out on the side of the road on a fringe of Montreal.
And inside today are John and Yoko Lennon ...
here to talk about their "War is Over" campaign.
***
[Yoko Ono] We stayed at Ronnie Hawkins's place.
And it was very nice, because it was a controlled situation ...
where we had some journalists come ...
but the ones that we wanted to speak to, etcetera. You know?
***
[Ronnie Hawkins] I think they had 40 telephone lines in there. And I mean, they were going all the time. Whether they were making [or getting] phone calls: Princess Margaret, Peter Sellers, you know. The Ambassador to Japan. And a million people over there that was big shots. I never even knew who they were.
***
[Narrator] John and Yoko once again headed to Ottawa, and the goal that had eluded them eight months earlier.
This time plans were firming up to bring them together with Pierre Trudeau.
***
[John Lennon] I can only judge by second and third-hand reports in papers, and the impression he made in England. And he seems good, you know.
[Reporter] Do you think he represents a sort of New Age --
[John Lennon] Well, he does seem to be this side of the Stone Age. Like, he seems to be youth-oriented. Just the way he looks, for a kickoff, now and then.
When he was in London, he went to the Alatoozie[?] I mean, that's like "In!"
***
[Ritchie Yorke] Even though they were anti-political in many ways, they'd never had the opportunity to meet with a world leader. The English leaders, Harold Wilson's own, just didn't want to know. They just considered them to be, you know, rock and roll crazies, you know? People you wouldn't associate with. Pierre Trudeau, however, had a bit more perceptive view on things. And his office embraced the possibility of meeting with John. He felt he had a lot he wanted to talk over with them. And this was a very important thing to John and Yoko, to be able to meet with a world leader, to be able to get him on their side, or at least sympathetic to their Cause.
And he was, ultimately.
***
[Narrator] They had a little warm-up with then-Health Minister John Monroe, as Lennon became increasingly nervous.
***
[Ritchie Yorke] Just the thought of liaising, meeting with, and talking with a prime minister ...
especially a guy that had this hip, cool image like Trudeau.
[Pierre Trudeau] [Doing a pirouette in front of the reporters]
[Ritchie Yorke] He wasn't like other prime ministers.
***
[Yoko Ono] We were waiting. And it was so exciting that we were kind of like holding hands. And we were nervous.
***
[Ritchie Yorke] You almost laughed, except you were afraid they'd be annoyed. That's how nervous I got.
And then John was biting his nails, chain-smoking, and carrying on.
He was so gracious and warm, and came out ...
and extended a very warm welcome to them.
And the meeting went on for like 45 or 50 minutes.
It had only been scheduled for 15. And they just got into a whole lot of topics.
***
[Reporter] What took so long in there?
[John Lennon] [Laughing] Well, I don't know. How long was it?
[Yoko Ono] It was an agreeable conversation, that's why.
[John Lennon] Well, let me say that we achieved something by communication and talk, even old-fashioned as it is. As a communication method, it is still the method we use. And talk is the basic start to any communication.
[Yoko Ono] [Camera never shows her face] And also, we got great incentive by just meeting him, and seeing that there are such people like him in the Establishment.
***
[Yoko Ono] He was a very kind of sensitive, almost like an artist, kind of delicate, sensitive kind of person.
And the first thing he told us was the fact that, you know, he'd read John's book, which made John relax a little, you know.
And it was great! Yeah.
***
[John Lennon] If all politicians were like Mr. Trudeau, there would be world peace.
***
[Allan Rock] And it was great to have those two together. Because, you know, I've thought the world of Pierre Trudeau, too. And you know how we felt about him in '68 and '69, the expectations we had for Trudeau, and a different approach to public office and public life. And seeing those two together was somehow fitting.
***
[Yoko Ono] Well, isn't it amazing that at the time -- I think it was very important that people like Pierre Trudeau and John Lennon existed.
But at the time, John and I kept saying that, "We're not the leaders. Don't follow us. You know, you have to do your own thing."
***
[Narrator] After meeting with Trudeau, John and Yoko's Peace Campaign was building up steam.
Ritchie Yorke and Ronnie Hawkins flew off to tell the world.
***
[Ritchie Yorke] We took off early in January, and went to 15 countries, sort of representing John and Yoko. We were getting contacts from each of these countries so that when we did the Peace Festival, we could do a tel-style linkup. We could satellite it all around the world. And we needed people in each country that could do that.
***
[Narrator] In Hong Kong, they took the message to the Chinese border ...
and then, accidentally, over it! They were arrested.
***
[Ronnie Hawkins] And I wouldn't have gone if I'd known that the only thing that separates Hong Kong County from Mainland China ...
is a barrier in the middle of a highway that just keeps on going.
Well, boy, all of a sudden we were surrounded by Red Guard.
But I would have jumped out if I'd known I was going in there and not having a permit.
***
[Narrator] John and Yoko had returned to England ...
but already the Canadian festival was in trouble.
The problem was money.
***
[Ritchie Yorke] Everything looked good. The plan was to charge, because John and Yoko often expressed the thing that you can't expect people to do something for nothing. But the idea was to pay people a salary for the job they did. And then the profits of the entire event to go to the Peace Campaign.
***
[John Lennon] If I can get paid for a performance, I'll take it.
But if it's a case of it can't be afforded, or it would be better if I didn't get paid, I won't get paid. We've done the Plastic Ono Band, and that's also whoever else is around, have only appeared three so far. If I get the Beatles, I might have to pay them!
***
[Yoko Ono] When you want to organize something like that ...
then we have to become like organizers.
And we were not very good at that.
John and I felt that we were good in expressing our feelings for peace, and any import for world peace, and all that, in our own way. In an artistic way, such as maybe doing a bed-in, which we did, you know? But when we start to become an organizer to try to collect people, collect other artists and all that, and make something out of that ...
we weren't the kind of people who can do that.
***
[Ritchie Yorke] Later on, John suddenly had the idea that he had a plan for the festival to be free. And of course, Brower was not thrilled at that prospect, because having to put on a free festival --
***
[John Brower] Obviously, saying that it had to be free ...
for a dollar was the death knell to us.
You know, that was the end.
***
[Yoko Ono] Well, we thought we can do it. But then, the world was not ready for it. it seems like.
And, you know, these days, you know, you can get a sponsor to sponsor and make a real great concert, or something like that. But in those days, I don't think these big corporations were, I mean, they didn't think of an idea like that.
And also, if they had thought of it, I don't think they would have gone for it because, well ...
they would have been scared to sponsor something like a Peace Festival.
***
[Narrator] The gulf was too wide.
The split inevitable.
The newspapers told the story: the festival to end all festivals was dead.
John and Yoko's campaign never stopped. There were many rallies, protests, and manifestos still to come.
***
[Reporter] At ten to 11 last night, John Lennon, wife his wife Yoko Ono ...
returned in a limousine from a recording session ...
to The Dakota, a luxury apartment building ...
on Manhattan's upper west side.
Thirty seconds later, on his way into the building ...
Lennon was shot at least four times.
John Lennon was taken in the backseat of a police car to a hospital near his home ...
and was pronounced dead on arrival.
***
[Yoko Ono] Everything we did was, in a way, connected with promoting world peace. And you know, fate would have it that -- I don't know, I don't know if it was connected with that or not, but John's not here anymore.
***
[John Lennon] We've been on our peace gig, as we call it, for a year solid. And people say, "Well, do you think it's having any effect?" Or "Will it catch on?" And all that. I can't answer that. It's like asking me in the cavern, "Are you going to make it?" In the back of my mind I thought, "I'm going to make it." But I couldn't lay it on the line about when and how. I just knew we had something. It's like we've all just woken up one morning and thought, "Was it a dream? Is it a nightmare? What's been going on?" And we're all just trying to make the next day a bit better.
***
[Yoko Ono] At the time we thought that probably we were going to have world peace in a year.
[Laughs] No, that's a joke, you know. But yes, we were kind of impatient people. We thought we did a great thing, and this is going to affect the world, or something like that. And then we realized that it wasn't happening that quickly. And I think we had to learn patience.
***
[Ritchie Yorke] I think it was a very positive thing. I mean, cynics, and so on, have, over the years, given it a bit of caning, and say, you know, how stupid and naive all these people were, John and Yoko were, and the people that supported them. But I didn't see it that way. I see it as a valiant attempt by a bunch of young people who felt hopeless, trying to, you know, paint some sort of a picture of optimism in the world.
***
[John Brower] What is naive is in the mind of the beholder. It's like beauty. We lived for that truth in those years. History may have shown us that it was a little naive ...
but nonetheless it was intense and it was real. And it was the truth of the times.
***
[Allan Rock] I think it gave us something to get behind. And also some reason for hope that there was in fact going to be a different approach to things in public life ...
a different ethic that would prevail, that there was someone out there speaking for things we all believed so deeply in.
***
[Yoko Ono] I hope that there will be a time when the world will really be so peaceful that they forget the word "peace." And they would, of course, forget about all the people who did anything for it, probably. And that's fine.
***
[John Lennon] Because we haven't gotten peace in these seven days doesn't make it a waste of time, though.
[Patrick Watson] No, I don't mean that. Because we never have peace while we're alive together.
[John Lennon] Oh, yes we will!
[Yoko Ono] We will, yeah!
[Patrick Watson] You really think so?
[John Lennon] Yeah, sure! I believe -- sincerely -- as soon as people want peace, and know where they can have it, they will have it!
***
[Times Square, New York, December 2000. Commissioned by Yoko Ono.] Over 676,000 people have been killed by guns in the U.S.A. since John Lennon was shot and killed on December 8, 1980.
IMAGINE
Director: Paul McGrath
Producer: Alan Lysaght
Editor: Liz Rosch
Associate Producer: Doug Thompson
Narrator: Laurie Brown
Audio Post: Jody Ellis
Cameras: David Donnelly, Maurice Chabot, Brian Shephard, Jeff Cole, Hiroyuki Ishigaki (Japan Satellite Broadcasting)
Visual Research: Francis Litzinger
Archive Images: Yoko Ono, The Lenono Photo Archives; Gibraltar Wedding Photographs, by David Nutter; The National Library of Canada; Ritchie Yorke; Health Canada; CP Picture Archive; Toronto Daily Star, reproduced by permission of the Toronto Star Syndicate; Jerry Levitan; ITN; Peter Miniaci-Beatlemania Shoppe; The Town Dump Retro Fun; Showtime Music Archive; Sarah Jane Growe; Some "Bed In" Footage taken from the film, "Bed Peace", © 1969 Yoko Ono, all rights reserved.
Original Music: Rick Whitelaw
Music: "Give Peace a Chance," written by John Lennon, (p) 1969. The copyright in this sound recording is owned by Yoko Ono Lennon under exclusive licence to EMI Records Ltd. Appearing Courtesy of EMI Music Canada Inc. Lennon Music Administered by Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC. All rights reserved. Used by permission.
CBC Newsworld: Tassie Notar
CBC News: Penny Essex
Produced by Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, © MM