If Paul McCartney had known the current turpitude targeting Penny Lane, would he still have composed his famous nostalgic ballad telling his memories of childhood in Liverpool? Would he have told the story of this barber in the same way who collects photos of all those he met? And this banker who never puts on a raincoat when it is pouring rain, or even this fireman who spends his time cleaning his shiny truck?
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"Penny Lane stays in my ears and in my eyes / There under the blue skies of the suburbs / I sit down and I take a step back" sang the ex-Beatles naively in 1967 in the famous song from the album Magical Mystery Tour . It is perhaps this retreat that many people who need to rename the name of this route south of Liverpool would really need right now, because it would be linked to James Penny, the owner of an 18th century slave ship century.
Thus, four street signs were covered with spray paint and the inscription "racist" was discovered on the wall above one of them. They were cleaned on Friday. These degradations come at a time when the protest movement against references to the colonial heritage is swelling in the United Kingdom, in the wake of worldwide indignation caused by the death of George Floyd, killed by a white police officer in the United States.
The controversy has raged in recent days in Liverpool, but according to its mayor Joe Anderson, there is no evidence that the street was so named to refer to the slave trader James Penny. According to a spokesperson for the Liverpool International Slavery Museum, the debate exists, "but the evidence is inconclusive." A local elected official, Richard Hemp, said that the name of the slave owner was written Penney and that this street had existed “for over 500 years, before Penney, before slavery. According to him, "it has nothing to do with it."
The mayor of Liverpool refuses tooth and nail to change the name of the street Penny Lane, even after having knowledge of these allegations. In the Daily Mail , Joe Anderson said there was "no evidence" today to support the claim that the Penny Lane made famous by the Beatles route is linked to James Penny, this merchant and anti-abolitionist having acquired his wealth by being a slave.
What is more, Penny Lane was not included in the list of dozens of statues, street names and other works of art that Black Lives Matter protesters are asking to have removed because of their links to the trafficking slaves.
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The business started when a surfer challenged the mayor to take the “daring gamble” to change the name of Penny Lane. Joe Anderson then replied that there was "no evidence that Penny Lane could bear the name of the slave trader James Penny", claiming that this name came rather from an historic toll bridge "having cost a penny " (A" penny "). And he added: "We are working with ethnic minority communities, as well as with historians to examine all of this in the rules. "
Today, in Britain, no less than 72 memorials honoring colonial figures are threatened with destruction by activists on their website "Topple the Racists" (literally "Knock Down Racists").
Black Lives Matter protesters demolished the statue of slave trader Edward Colston last weekend and rolled it over in Bristol Harbor.