The Dakota building is where John Lennon was killed on 1980, dec 8th.
The gun was owned and fired by Mark Chapman, the chubby guy who Lennon is signing an autograph to, on the photo above.
Two months earlier, Chapman already made the trip from Honolulu (where he works as security guard) to NYC, but failed to go all the way and kill the guy who used to be his favorite Beatle. “An hypocrite, a traitor”, would later say Chapman, “He told us to imagine no possessions, and there he was, with millions of dollars and yachts and farms and country estates, laughing at people like me who had believed the lies and bought the records and built a big part of their lives around his music.”
About 10.30 am that day, Chapman woke up in his Sheraton hotel room, opened his bible looking for his favorite part, The Gospel of John, and added “Lennon” next to it. Then he headed to the Dakota, and waited.
Around 5 pm, Lennon shows up. Along with a couple of other fans, Chapman walks towards him with a shy smile, gets his Double Fantasy album signed. The infamous pic is taken. “Is that all you want ?”, politely ask the Beatle.
The question shook Chapman, who was expecting a brush-off.
The kill would have to wait, then.
10.49 pm. John and Yoko get out of their limo, back from a session at the Record Plant.
10.50 pm. As Ono rushes into the building, vaguely followed by a slow Lennon, Chapman pulls a .38 out his coat and fires 5 hollow point rounds on his ex-idol. Lennon is hit, but doesn’t fall. Instead, he starts running as he get shot, run up six steps into the concierge station, and collapse. Four of the shots got into him. One pierced his aorta.
Then Chapman simply sits on the curb, opens his bag and starts reading The Catcher in the Rye, -a book he already read and bought again that morning-, until police arrived.
Oddly enough, Salinger’s book isn’t the only one linked with the Dakota‘s history.
Rosemary’s Baby, Ira Levin‘s novel, was adapted and shot in this very building by Roman Polansky, with John Cassavetes and Mia Farrow, who’d later move in the building and actually be present the day Lennon was killed.
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