Maureen Starkey Tigrett

Who was Maureen Starkey Tigrett?

Maureen "Mo" Starkey Tigrett, née Mary Cox, was a hairdresser from Liverpool, England. best known as the first wife of the Beatles' drummer, Ringo Starr. She met Starr at The Cavern Club, where The Beatles were playing, when she was a trainee hairdresser in Liverpool. Starr proposed marriage at the Ad-Lib Club in London, on 20 January 1965. They married at the Caxton Hall Register Office, London, in 1965, and divorced in 1975.

First living at 34 Montagu Square, Marylebone, the Starrs bought Sunny Heights, in St George's Hill, Weybridge. In 1973, they bought Tittenhurst Park from John Lennon. They had three children together: Zak, Jason, and a daughter, Lee. As a favour to Starr, Frank Sinatra recorded a special version of "The Lady Is a Tramp" for Maureen's 22nd birthday in 1968.

Maureen died at home of leukaemia on 30 December 1994, after receiving treatment at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle, Washington. Her four children, mother, then-husband and ex-husband Starr were at her bedside when she died.