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Jet Harris

Jet Harris, English bass player (died 2011)

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Born
July 6, 1939
Died
March 18, 2011
Zodiac sign
Cancer
Birth year
1939

About Jet Harris

Terence "Jet" Harris was an English rock and roll musician. He was an original member of Cliff Richard's backing band the Shadows, serving as the bass guitarist from the group's inception until April 1962, after which he had success as a soloist and as a duo with that band's drummer, Tony Meehan. In 1958, while playing jazz with drummer Tony Crombie and his group the Rockets, Harris received a Framus bass guitar from Crombie and became one of the first British exponents of the instrument. In 1959, after the neck of his Framus was terminally damaged in a dressing room accident, Harris was presented by the importers with a Fender Precision Bass, one of the first to come to Britain from the United States. A publicity poster for the tour includes the straplines: "Jet Harris with the JETBLACKS" and "First Solo Appearance" alongside a photograph of Harris.

Biography source: Wikipedia. The profile adds birthday-specific historical context from the Celebs Birthday Today editorial database.

Jet Harris timeline

  1. In 1958, while playing jazz with drummer Tony Crombie and his group the Rockets, Harris received a Framus bass guitar from Crombie and became one of the first British exponents of the instrument.
  2. In 1959, after the neck of his Framus was terminally damaged in a dressing room accident, Harris was presented by the importers with a Fender Precision Bass, one of the first to come to Britain from the United States.

The world when Jet Harris was born

Jet Harris was born in 1939. The year snapshot below places that birthday in its cultural and historical setting: the music and films people were following, the headlines shaping public life, and the everyday prices families encountered.

Culture in 1939

  • #1 song"Over the Rainbow" – Judy Garland
  • Top movieGone with the Wind
  • Best-selling bookThe Grapes of Wrath – John Steinbeck

Headlines and milestones

  • Major sports momentLou Gehrig delivers his "Luckiest Man" farewell speech
  • Top headlineGermany invades Poland — World War II begins
  • Technology milestoneFirst regular television broadcasts in the US (NBC)
  • Defining fadThe Wizard of Oz mania
  • Notable inventionNylon stockings
  • World population2.30 billion

United States snapshot

  • U.S. leaderFranklin D. Roosevelt
  • Sports championNew York Yankees (World Series)
  • U.S. population130.9M

1939 versus 2026

These figures put everyday life in Jet Harris's birth year beside the site's latest United States snapshot.

Measure19392026
Gas$0.19$3.45/gal
Average home$5,200$435,000
Average income$2,900$67,500
Minimum wage$0.30$7.25/hr (federal)
Movie ticket$0.25$11.95
Postage stamp$0.03$0.73
Population130.9M341 million

Sources and editorial standards

This profile combines a biographical source with structured birthday and historical context. Sources recorded for this profile: Wikipedia, MusicBrainz, Wikidata. See our editorial policy for sourcing, corrections, and review standards.

Read the source biography on Wikipedia. Wikipedia text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License.