She was a few years older than
Julian Lennon when he enrolled at the private
Heath House School, in Weybridge, Surrey.
However, because
John Lennon and the other Beatles used to visit the
Richardson family's antique and jewellery shop, she knew Julian. So
when he became homesick and unsettled she would be called out of class
to sit with him while he drew pictures. One of those pictures was of
Lucy. One day John Lennon came into the shop and said, 'Hello, Lucy in
the sky with diamonds', but they thought it was just John being John.
However, when a song with that same name appeared on 1967's Sgt
Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band album, the family began to wonder.
And when Lennon announced he had been inspired by his son's picture of
a girl called Lucy, the pieces of the emotional jigsaw puzzle came
together. It was in a 1975 interview that Lennon said: "Julian came in
one day with a picture he painted about a school friend of his named
Lucy. He had sketched in some stars in the sky and called it Lucy in
the Sky with Diamonds."
Her mother said: "It was then we realised why he had been calling our
Lucy 'Lucy in the sky.'"
