One night in November 1963, four mop-topped lads from Liverpool strode triumphantly onto the stage of London's Prince of Wales Theater before an audience of upper-crust fans that included the Queen Mother herself. As TIME quoted the group's lanky, irreverent leader: "Those of you in the cheaper seats, clap. The rest of you, rattle your jewelry." With that remark, John Lennon made his first appearance in the pages of TIME. As the years went by, Lennon and his fellow Beatles have turned up countless times in the magazine--and in the lives of a fortunate handful of its writers and correspondents.

When the Beatles made their first visit to the U.S. in 1964, Senior Editor Christopher Porterfield, then a trainee in TIME'S Washington bureau, was assigned to follow them. Porterfield recalls: "All of them were joking and clowning a lot, but John's humor glinted with a fine, hard intelligence and had a mocking, satirical edge. He also had a sharper way with the language." Porterfield next encountered Lennon in 1968, when he and Paul McCartney were in New York to announce the formation of their own record label, Apple Corps., Ltd. Porterfield, who had written a TIME cover story on the group the year before, was again struck by Lennon's patience and courtesy. Three years later, Porterfield sat in Apple's London headquarters listening to Lennon speak with bitterness about the breakup of the Beatles. Says he: "John was thinner than the last time I had seen him and his appearance gave an extra intensity to the harshness of what he was saying. He was understandably preoccupied with pain and frustration, but there was also a great deal of determination and optimism."

Senior Editor Martha Duffy, who edited this week's cover stories on Lennon's tragic death and rich musical legacy, first met him in 1969. Duffy was in Toronto interviewing Novelist Jacqueline Susann, who was there to promote her book The Love Machine. When Susann found out that Lennon and Yoko Ono were staging their memorable "Lie-in for Peace" in her hotel, she insisted on paying her respects. Recalls Duffy: "I was surprised that they were so friendly and welcoming. John was very gentle but not in a soft way. He had a strong sense of himself."

Jay Cocks, who wrote the main story, first met Lennon in 1976 through mutual friends. Over the years Cocks found him to be "extraordinarily smart, witty, angry and basically unknowable."

Sums up Porterfield: "Of all the Beatles, Lennon was the one who showed the greatest depth and complexity. His was the growth I expected the most from, and now that growth has been cut short."

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