An interesting example of the social construction of a mystery occurred in the late months of 1969, when a strange surge of excitement spread across the country, fomented, apparently, by persistent rumors relating to the nature and circumstances of the alleged death of Beatle Paul McCartney. (p. 61)

The story, in gist, is as follows: Paul McCartney was allegedly killed in an automobile accident in England in November 1966. The remaining Beatles, fearing that public reaction to the news would adversely affect the fortunes of the group, agreed among themselves to keep the matter a secret. Since it was obvious that Paul could not simply disappear from their midst without rousing a storm of embarrassing questions, they hit upon the idea of hiring a double to play his part in public…. (p. 63)

For some unspecified reason, however, and at some unspecified time, the plot seems to have undergone a qualitative change. "What began," according to the Berkeley Tribe …, "for John Lennon as a scheme of deception conceived during moments of personal shock—and perhaps despair—developed into an all-encompassing religious vision."

Lennon's "all-encompassing religious vision," we are asked to believe, was oddly manifested by inserting cryptic messages relating to McCartney's death into the lyrics of songs and among the decorations on the Beatles' album covers….

It is undoubtedly difficult for anyone not immediately caught up in the collective excitement generated by this macabre story to take seriously the symbols regarded as significant by those who were intensely involved in it. Nevertheless, for a period of several weeks they were taken seriously and by a surprisingly diverse body of people. (p. 64)

To account for the initial appearance of the rumor is, perhaps, the most perplexing aspect of the phenomenon. It seemed to emerge from out of nowhere, in response to nothing in particular and, as if at once to explain and justify its presence, the clues seemed similarly to emerge. But to realize the fact of the death depended upon recognizing the existence of the clues, and the clues were only recognizable if one were aware of the death. And so there is no external logic to guide a decision as to where the fundamental ambiguity lies—in the death or in the clues—since it is impossible to establish a priority between them. (p. 66)

Clearly, the rumor's underlying logic is difficult to discern—so difficult, in fact, that—if logic can be said to exist at all—it appears that it must be sought outside the immediate subject of discourse. If this is the case, the rumor should be regarded as essentially symbolic, its characters and events standing for as yet unknown (and perhaps unknowable) social concerns. As such, its function is symptomatic; expressive rather than expository, problem-indicative rather than problem-solving.

The intriguing question inevitably poses itself as to why a group of young English pop singers should become the symbol for the expression of a social malaise. A clear answer is not easy to provide. It does seem reasonable to assume, however, that it is in some way related to the climate of intense excitement the group universally seemed to evoke. (p. 67)

The most striking characteristic of the McCartney phenomenon is probably its preoccupation with the covert. Whether emphasizing concealment as in the idea that the rumor was covering a sales promotional gimmick or revelation that it stemmed from John Lennon's motivation to communicate "the truth"—the "hidden meaning" motif recurs thematically both in the content of the rumor and in the explanations put forth to account for it.

There are, in all likelihood, many and various reasons for a public fascination with the idea of the concealed. The death rumor may be, for example, an inconsequential but interesting expression of the ethos of the Freudian epoch: an essentially artistic creation indicating public awareness of the concept of the unconscious—a folk equivalent of Surrealism.

Again, the fact that many persons apparently resisted all reasonable explications offered in the mass media, preferring to accept interpretations stressing occultism and deceit, may point to a widespread lack of faith in the reliability of information received through formal channels of communication. It may indicate that the much-discussed "credibility gap" is taking its toll by developing publics increasingly inclined to turn to folk communicational resources.

However, the strange content of the rumor and its obdurate quality—the previously discussed failure of its publics to interest themselves in reaching consensual explanation—both suggest that there is something more than a mistrust of news agencies involved in this instance.

Another possibility is that there is demonstrated here a process of ordering seemingly random and chaotic facts into a system of meaning, the sense of the covert being somehow related to an inherent significance which is assumed to underlie the events of the world.

The Beatles had, over the years, moved from the straightforward, comprehensible statements of the "I Want to Hold Your Hand"—"I Saw Her Standing There" period of 1963 to the confusing and seemingly unintegrated verbal streams that are characteristic of many of the 1967 songs: "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds," for example, and "I Am the Walrus."

The "absurdity" of the songs was reflected in the style of the album cover decorations, those of the later years being typically designed as collages of apparently unrelated and randomly selected items.

Randomness can create a fertile field for subjective interpretation: one man's nonsense is another's apocalypse. To avoid the terror stemming from idiosyncratic isolation, however, it is necessary to establish a social basis of confirmation—some criterial standard—that what one takes to be a meaning is accepted and shared by others. Some such meaning-establishing process seemed to be indicated by the behavior of the younger adolescents as they busily conferred with one another evaluating the orthodoxy of the existence and interpretation of specific "clues."

It may be that the McCartney rumor reflects a search for meaning that runs much deeper than a seemingly frivolous preoccupation with pop song lyrics and album cover art would seem to suggest. In periods of social unrest and upheaval, when traditional sources of authority are being challenged and overthrown, there is always the danger that human institutions will dissolve into primal meaninglessness…. Perhaps there is a search for a new basis of authority and understanding represented here that is as profound as, on the surface, it may appear ridiculous.

That this fascination with the mystic seems particularly prevalent among the young makes sense when explained in the theoretical terms of adolescent identity crisis. Since it is this age group that most typically lacks the integrated convictions that might help to sustain a sense of basic meaning in times of extreme and rapid change, these are logically the ones whose worlds are most vulnerable when established bases of authority are assaulted.

In the past, it has surely been the function of great religions to organize and sustain the meanings and values of a society, but ours is a secular age. Basic religious tenets have been increasingly challenged by science; basic religious values have been subordinated to marketplace competition. It is probably not strange, then, that many aspects of the McCartney death story suggest an abortive attempt to apotheosize Paul McCartney.

There are five specific properties of the McCartney phenomenon that would seem to support a conjecture that a myth- or legend-creating process was at work.

(1) The content was relatively stable, lacking the ongoing, developmental quality that usually characterizes a news story. Among its believers, the story was taught and learned, deviations from the theme were definitely discouraged, and the fundamental details were memorized like a litany.

(2) The story shared with the legend a quality of empirical irrelevance. To whom, after all, but a few academicians, does it matter if legendary heroes actually lived and did the deeds attributed to them? The significance of the story transcends the details of individual biography. The fact, or lack of it, of the death of Paul McCartney seemed similarly irrelevant to its publics. The inference, then, is that the Paul McCartney of this story was a symbol, a social construct that no longer required the facts of a personal existence to sustain it.

(3) An almost Gothic engrossment with death and the occult permeated virtually every aspect of the phenomenon—twin themes that are fundamental to myth.

(The above properties, taken together, seem to fall into a familiar and ancient pattern. One senses in their conjunction a curious mandate that something must be fulfilled, calling for the recapitulation of a legend.)

(4) The content of the story recalls the pattern that categorically defines a cyclical myth. The untimely death of a beautiful youth who is subsequently transformed into or revealed to be a god is a recurrent mythical theme and is presumed to reflect the cyclical process in nature. The legends of Osiris, Adonis, Dionysis, and Jesus have all conformed, in some major way to this pattern. It may be that the McCartney rumor represents an aborted attempt to re-create such a myth. Perhaps in the present, as in the past, humans may be trying to make sense out of the apparent senselessness of their own deaths by suggesting, analogously, the possibility of reincarnation. Alternatively, such a myth may be a process whereby socially valued qualities of an exemplary youth can be abstracted into an idealized model and thus preserved from the eroding onslaughts of ongoing reality (a motivation described by Wallace Stevens as "nostalgia for perfection.")

Whatever the reason for the recurring beautiful-dead-youth theme, its resonance in the McCartney story was clearly discernible. An embarrassed but eerie longing for the story to be true—for Paul to be really dead—was repeatedly expressed, such expression being invariably accompanied by protestations of admiration or love for the singer.

(5) Clearly the rumor had high entertainment value. Not only did it provide a fascinating subject for conversation, but it also invoked—particularly among younger adolescents—a fearful, brooding, supernatural mood which they obviously found rather more enjoyable than otherwise. The entertainment component is an important factor in the promulgation of a myth since the pleasure of its company makes its repetition a likelihood.

                                    (pp. 68-72)

Mystery resulting from ignorance can pose a potential and serious threat to human survival; as such, it urges the pursuit of knowledge to dispel it. Mystery, on the other hand, can provide a basis for human meaning, its sacred (and secret) premises upholding the perception of reality. In its latter function, it can be created and preserved by social volition; it can be institutionalized into a religion. (p. 73)

The public stir attending the "death" of Paul McCartney was obviously an amusing but trivial social phenomenon: short-lived and probably inconsequential. That it should have spread as widely and as rapidly as it did, however, suggests that there are processes of social interaction at work that it might well behoove us to examine more carefully. However foolish its guise, the McCartney rumor clearly indicates that there is a potential for irrational belief and action—be it constructive or be it destructive to what or whose values—that is alive and well in the modern, industrialized, "enlightened" world. (p. 74)

Barbara Suczek, "The Curious Case of the 'Death' of Paul McCartney," in Urban Life and Culture (copyright © 1972 by Sage Publications, Inc.; reprinted by permission of the Publisher, Sage Publications, Inc.), Vol. 1, No. 1 (April 1972), pp. 61-76.