Get the Echo newsletter - it has never been more important to stay informed Sign me up now Thank you for subscribing We have more newsletters Show me See our privacy notice Invalid Email

A WEBSITE devoted to random meetings between the public and The Beatles over the years is set to become a book.

The Facebook page, called The Beatles And Me, was set up “for a bit of a laugh” according to its creator Dean Johnson.

But, in just a few months, it has pictures and stories from hundreds of encounters with John, Paul, George and Ringo over the decades.

It has become so successful that Dean and Jennifer Smedley, the creative director of Liverpool-based Plantapress, now plan to turn the web page into a book.

Jennifer said the idea came up after she met Dean through a mutual friend.

She said: “Dean told me about it and how he thought it would make a good book – and I thought ‘Yes, let’s do it’.”

The book will be Plantapress’ fourth title and they believe it will attract wide interest. Jennifer said: “I think it has real global interest and potential. It is so unusual and has such personal stories – I think there will be a massive market for it.”

The aim is to publish it in March to coincide with the first 50th anniversary of the first Beatles album, Please Please Me.

Dean, the curator of a museum devoted to the war poet Wilfred Owen, said the reaction on Facebook was unexpected, but “fantastic”.

He said: “I was especially pleased with the response from the USA – people are so proud of their own piece of Beatles history.

“They are the people who made Beatlemania happen and the previously unseen pics are very exciting to see.

“We seem to have created an outlet for people to share these treasured memories.

“Everyone in Merseyside seems to have a Beatles story.

“We want to document the fans’ side of the Beatlemania phenomenon.

“We have already received some wonderful accounts and pictures from the public, including someone who loaned his entire collection of Gene Vincent records to original Beatle Stuart Sutcliffe.”

Jennifer added: “Perhaps the most touching story is when somebody was stopped outside The Cavern Club a few months before George [Harrison] died and some scruffy guy asked ‘Where is a good place to eat? It has all changed around here’.

“It turned out it was George coming back home one last time.”