Television: John Lennon in conversation with Marshall McLuhan

During his final Canadian peace campaign of 1969, John Lennon took part in a number of media engagements. Two occurred on this day, the first at the department of culture and technology at the University of Toronto.

CBS-TV, a US television network, scheduled and filmed a summit between Lennon and the Canadian philosopher and academic Marshall McLuhan. The encounter took place at McLuhan’s office at the university faculty, and lasted for 45 minutes.

Although the footage has never surfaced, and may never have even been broadcast, a follow-up interview with Lennon was. Lasting for five minutes, the interview opens with Lennon discussing whether his campaigning would affect his art. He gives a typical response, saying all his activities were essentially artistic, and that art had no limits.

He went on to say that each country had a different reaction to his peace campaigns, and said that the English failed to take him and Yoko Ono seriously. He felt in America their message was more accepted in New York than in the southern states.

Lennon and Ono then gave a Christmas with of “peace on Earth”. Lennon explained further his hopes: “That implies no violence. No starving children. No violent minds, no violent households. No violence.”