The lined sheet torn from John Lennon’s high school detention book.John Lennon’s mischievous schooldays have been revealed in a page torn from his high school detention book.
The single page shines a unique light on a rebellious 15-year-old Lennon and records 29 occasions between September 9, 1955, and July 11, 1956, when he received detention at Quarry Bank High School in Allerton, Liverpool. It will be offered for sale along with a letter from Lennon’s childhood friend Pete Shotton at Sotheby’s London auction on Tuesday and is expected to fetch £2,000-£3,000.
The sheet shows Lennon received five separate detentions in one day on September 12, 1955, for “no hwk” (homework), “impertinence”, “talk after 2 warnings” and “further talk”.
Lack of homework is recorded on three other occasions along with transgressions including “not wearing school cap”, “groaning at me”, “silly conduct” and the frequent “nuisance in class”.
The vendor claims the page was rescued from a bonfire at the school in the late 1970s. A staff member reportedly spotted the name Lennon on the pages of old books he had been told to clear from a storage cupboard. Other pages from the detention book were salvaged but have since been lost or destroyed.
Pete Shotton’s accompanying letter describes Lennon as “his closest childhood friend”.
The sheet shows Lennon received five detentions in one day
The pair started at Quarry Bank High School together in September 1952 and he said they were “almost inseparable, to the extent that John referred to us as Shennon and Lotton”.
Shotton said the two were classmates for five years but spent most of their time fooling around and receiving frequent detentions.
The lot is part of Sotheby’s Rock & Pop sale which will feature the 1962 contract between the Beatles and Brian Epstein, Bob Dylan’s typewritten lyrics to A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall and a grand piano used in almost all of Abba’s studio recordings between 1973 and 1977.
The detention sheet will go on public exhibition at Sotheby’s from September 24-28.