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This Geni Project lists all of the people portrayed on the cover of this important album. The purpose is to expand their trees and connect them to Geni's World Family Tree.
The Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band remains the most iconic album cover of all time. From Paul McCartney’s original concept to the final design, staged by British pop artist Peter Blake and his then-wife, Jann Haworth, it’s not just an album cover, but a dazzling display of modern art that defines its era.
Not only a groundbreaking design for the time, the artwork also broke the bank, costing almost £3,000 to create – well over £50,000 in today’s money and more than any other pop album sleeve at that time. The concept was for the four Beatles themselves to appear in costume as Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, surrounded by a gathering of influential people as if they had just performed a concert. A total of 58 different people are depicted on the final artwork.
- (1) Sri Yukteswar Giri (Hindu guru)
- (2) Aleister Crowley (occultist)
- (3) Mae West (actress)
- (4) Lenny Bruce (comedian)
- (5) Karlheinz Stockhausen (composer)
- (6) W. C. Fields (comedian/actor)
- (7) Carl Jung (psychiatrist)
- (8) Edgar Allan Poe (writer)
- (9) Fred Astaire (actor/dancer)
- (10) Richard Merkin (artist)
- (11) The Vargas Girl (by artist Alberto Vargas)
- (12) Leo Gorcey (image was removed from cover, but a space remains)
- (13) Huntz Hall (actor)
- (14) Simon Rodia (designer and builder of the Watts Towers)
- (15) Bob Dylan (singer/songwriter)
- (16) Aubrey Beardsley (illustrator)
- (17) Robert Peel|Sir Robert Peel (19th century British Prime Minister)
- (18) Aldous Huxley (writer)
- (19) Dylan Thomas (poet)
- (20) Terry Southern (writer)
- (21) Dion DiMucci (singer/songwriter)
- (22) Tony Curtis (actor)
- (23) Wallace Berman (artist)
- (24) Tommy Handley (comedian)
- (25) Marilyn Monroe (actress)
- (26) William S. Burroughs (writer)
- (27) Sri Mahavatar Babaji (Hindu guru)
- (28) Stan Laurel (actor/comedian)
- (29) Richard Lindner (artist)
- (30) Oliver Hardy (actor/comedian)
- (31) Karl Marx (political philosopher)
- (32) H. G. Wells (writer)
- (33) Sri Paramahansa Yogananda (Hindu guru)
- (34A) James Joyce (Irish poet and novelist) – barely visible below Bob Dylan
- (34) Mannequin (hairdresser's wax dummy)
- (35) Stuart Sutcliffe (artist/former Beatle)
- (36) Mannequin (hairdresser's wax dummy)
- (37) Max Miller (comedian)
- (38) The Petty Girl (by George Petty)
- (39) Marlon Brando (actor)
- (40) Tom Mix (actor)
- (41) Oscar Wilde (writer)
- (42) Tyrone Power (actor)
- (43) Larry Bell (artist)|Larry Bell (artist)
- (44) David Livingstone (missionary/explorer)
- (45) Johnny Weissmuller (Olympic swimmer/Tarzan actor)
- (46) Stephen Crane (writer) – barely visible between Issy Bonn's head and raised arm
- (47) Issy Bonn (comedian)
- (48) George Bernard Shaw (playwright)
- (49) H. C. Westermann (sculptor)
- (50) Albert Stubbins (English footballer)
- (51) Sri Lahiri Mahasaya (guru)
- (52) Lewis Carroll (writer)
- (53) T. E. Lawrence ("Lawrence of Arabia")
- (54) Wax model of Sonny Liston (boxer)
- (55) The Petty Girl (by George Petty)
- (56) Wax model of George Harrison
- (57) Wax model of John Lennon
- (58) Shirley Temple (child actress) – barely visible behind the wax models of John and Ringo, first of three appearances on the cover
- (59) Wax model of Ringo Starr
- (60) Wax model of Paul McCartney
- (61) Albert Einstein (physicist) – largely obscured
- (62) John Lennon holding a French horn
- (63) Ringo Starr holding a trumpet
- (64) Paul McCartney holding a cor anglais
- (65) George Harrison holding a piccolo
- (65A) Bette Davis (actress) – hair barely visible on top of George's shoulder
- (66) Bobby Breen (singer)
- (67) Marlene Dietrich (actress/singer)
- (68) Mahatma Gandhi was planned for this position, but was deleted prior to publication
- (69) An American legionnaire
- (70) Wax model of Diana Dors (actress)
- (71) Shirley Temple (child actress) – second appearance on the cover
- (72) An idol of the Hindu goddess Lakshmi
Links
Interactive cover at the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography