Tara Browne (4 March 1945 – 18 December 1966) was an Irish socialite and heir to a part of the Guinness fortune. His December 1966 death in a car crash was referenced in

the Beatles The Beatles were an English Rock music, rock band formed in Liverpool in 1960. The core lineup of the band comprised John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr. They are widely regarded as the Cultural impact of the Beatle ...

' song " A Day in the Life".

Early life

Browne was the younger son of the 4th Baron Oranmore and Browne, who was also the 2nd Baron Mereworth, and Oonagh Guinness. His father, Lord Oranmore and Browne, was an

Anglo-Irish Anglo-Irish people () denotes an ethnic, social and religious grouping who are mostly the descendants and successors of the English Protestant Ascendancy in Ireland. They mostly belong to the Anglican Church of Ireland, which was the State rel ...

peer and member of the

House of Lords The House of Lords is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Like the lower house, the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminster in London, England. One of the oldest ext ...

who served in that house for 72 years, longer than any other peer up to that time (ending only by eviction during government reforms in 1999). His mother, Oonagh Guinness, was an heiress to the Guinness fortune. Browne was a member of

Swinging London The Swinging Sixties was a youth-driven cultural revolution that took place in the United Kingdom during the mid-to-late 1960s, emphasising modernity and fun-loving hedonism, with Swinging London denoted as its centre. It saw a flourishing in ...

counterculture of the 1960s The counterculture of the 1960s was an anti-establishment cultural phenomenon and political movement that developed in the Western world during the mid-20th century. It began in the early 1960s, and continued through the early 1970s. It is ofte ...

and had stood to inherit £1 million at age 25. In August 1963, at age 18, he married Noreen "Nicky" MacSherry; the couple had two sons, Dorian and Julian. For his 21st birthday, he threw a "lavish" party at Luggala, the Gothic Browne family seat in the Wicklow Mountains, where "two private jets flew the 200 or so guests to Ireland, including John Paul Getty, Mick Jagger, Brian Jones ndJones' then-girlfriend Anita Pallenberg." Browne facilitated his friend

Paul McCartney Sir James Paul McCartney (born 18 June 1942) is an English singer, songwriter and musician who gained global fame with the Beatles, for whom he played bass guitar and the piano, and shared primary songwriting and lead vocal duties with John ...

's first LSD trip in 1966, at Browne's home in Belgravia. His life was captured in Paul Howard's biography ''I Read the News Today, Oh Boy'', published in 2016.

Death

On 17 December 1966, Browne was driving with his girlfriend,

model A model is an informative representation of an object, person, or system. The term originally denoted the plans of a building in late 16th-century English, and derived via French and Italian ultimately from Latin , . Models can be divided in ...

Suki Potier, in his Lotus Elan through South Kensington at high speed (some reports suggesting in excess of 106 mph/170 km/h). Miss Potier however told an inquest that Tara drove “not very fast” down Earls Court road into Redcliffe gardens. Browne proceeded through the junction of Redcliffe Square and Redcliffe Gardens, colliding with a parked lorry. He died of his injuries the following day. Potier told the inquest “Suddenly I saw this white car coming at the crossroads”. Potier claimed that Browne swerved the car to absorb the impact of the crash to save her life. ''“''There would have been a collision with the white car if Tara had not swerved – and I think I would have been killed.” At the inquest, Pathologist Dr Donald Teare said that Mr Browne had drunk only from half-a-pint to a pint of beer. The inquest jury gave a verdict of accidental death. Browne's body was brought back to Ireland and buried on the Guinness family's Luggala Estate. His grave is one of three situated on the shore of Lough Tay, next to an ornamental building known as the Temple; the two other people buried there are his unnamed baby brother, who was born and died in December 1943, and his half-sister. Following his death, his estranged wife launched a public legal battle for custody of their two young children; Browne's mother also sought custody. A judge eventually ruled that the boys should live with their grandmother.

"A Day in the Life"

The death of Browne inspired some of the lyrics of the song " A Day in the Life" by

, which was released on their 1967 album '' Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band''. In a 1980 interview with '' Playboy'' magazine,

John Lennon John Winston Ono Lennon (born John Winston Lennon; 9 October 19408 December 1980) was an English singer-songwriter, musician and activist. He gained global fame as the founder, co-lead vocalist and rhythm guitarist of the Beatles. Lennon's ...

said, "I was reading the paper one day ..the Guinness heir who killed himself in a car. That was the main headline story. He died in London in a car crash." Lennon, who was a friend of Browne, read the coroner's verdict into Browne's death while composing music at his piano. It was this news which inspired him to write the following lines: In 1997,

gave a different explanation of these lines:

References

External links

All Experts
(archived)
Beatles SongfactsI Read the News Today, Oh Boy - Paul Howard
{{DEFAULTSORT:Browne, Tara 1945 births 1966 deaths Road incident deaths in London Tara Browne Younger sons of barons The Beatles Irish socialites Irish expatriates in the United Kingdom People from Dublin (city) British people of Irish descent