With the January arrival of Jane Asher in Boston to begin her tour of America starring in "Romeo and Juliet," Americans had their first opportunity to see her-the most famous sister in the pop world-in person. This despite the rumors which have had her altar-bound in Seattle, backstage with Peter and Gordon in Atlantic City or in the dugout at Shea Stadium.

For three years we U.S. girls have read about her, wondered about her and envied her. We have gone to see her films, written her countless thousands of letters, both kind and extremely rude, and taken up staring at her pictures in fan magazines trying to decide whether to become as much like her as possible, become her exact opposite in the hope that HE (Paul McCartney) might like a change-or just give up and committ suicide. And in the end solving the whole thing by drawing a moustache on her photo and constructively blacking out three of her front teeth.

In February, her brother, Peter Asher, followed Jane to America for his ninth tour of this country with his partner, Gordon Waller. By combining the innocent appeal of say, Peter Noone, and the graphic sexiness of Mick Jagger ("Girls want to mother me, " Peter one said, "and Gordon"), Peter and Gordon have remained top favorites with us as many of their countrymen (The Moody Blues, The Searchers, The Zombies, Gerry and the Pacemakers) have faded into relative obscurity.

Jane and Peter (and their younger sister Clare) inherited their mother's red hair. They were reared in a highly cultured, upper class home in London. Their father is an eminent Wimpole Street physician and their mother is a professor of the oboe at the Royal Academy of Music. They encouraged their children to use their mind and make their own decisions. Jane and Peter, who, at any rate, didn't need much encouragment in that direction, early possessed agile intelligence startling to those unprepared for it. They were sent to excellent schools, Jane to a small exclusive academy and Peter to Westiminster. Jane, who has been acting since childhood, decided not to go on to university and became a full time actress when she finished school at 16. Peter, though already singing with his classmate Gordon, went on for two years of philosophy at Kings College before chucking it to become a full time pop star.

You were aware of all of the aforementioned. Right.

They share many traits. Both are stubbornly independent and highly selective of their friends, keeping a small number of close ones virtually forever. Some call them snobbihs, but they aren't really, of course. They've been exposed too long to those who would know them not for what they are, but forwho they are.

They share an aura of remoteness, and their reactions are very tricky to decipher in their steady blue gazes. In fact, practically impossible. What makes it even more difficult is that Jane, particularly, is extremely adept at portraying emotions she does not feel. If she smiled warmly at you and two hundred and seven of your noisiest friends waiting outside the stage door ready to pounce on her en masse to get what souvenirs you could-she probably didn't mean it. Would you? If, however, you persuaded a hotel switchboard operator to ring Peter's room at 3 a.m. and you were crunched and resentful that he sounded sleepy and cross-well, he probably was. The Ashers respect the privacy of others (he wouldn't wake you in the middle of the night) and zealously cherish their own.

Fans writing to Jane Girlfriend receive no reply; as far as she is concerned there is no such person and the envelopes might as well be marked "Not Known At This Address." Letters to Jane Asher are treated in the nammer one would expect from a young lady who is very pleased that others buy tickets to her films and performances and watch her on television.

They get on well together, Jane and Peter, and always have, much to the amazement of the "Robin Hood" producer who broke his rule about casting siblings to act together and pessimistically expected them to do nothing but quarrel. They didn't then, don't now.

When she's in London, Jane is a loyal customer of Indica Books, of which Peter is a director. A bookshop was a natural business for Peter to establish, and for Jane to frequent, because they both read last thing at night, no matter how late the hour, and first thing on waking, perferring to rush about later to meet appointments. Aside from qualifying for a discount at Indica because of her relationship to one of the directors, she also more than earned it by helping Peter, John Dunbar and Miles paint the shop and build bookshelves.

Many English TV viewers remember the night three years ago when a newly released record was played to the Juke Box Jury panel, with Jane sitting on the panel. The producers of the show had promised not to play the record, because the guest panelist felt that she couldn't really be objective about it, but they had naturally broken their word and played it. It was "World Without Love" by a new duo, Peter and Gordon. In front of millions of people and to the laughter of the other members of the jury-because she was seventeen and her boyfriend had written the song and her brother sang it-Jane not only said that it was a hit, which was all she was required to say, but also, "It's going to be number ONE, I know it is," No one really remembers how the others voted after they had finished falling about laughing, but less than three weeks later Peter and Gordon knocked the Beatles from their positiion at the top of the pops with their very first record, a Lennon-McCartney compositon. And Jane Asher, who by then was quite accustomed to being right (for instance, about an up and coming group with a misspelled name and funny hair cuts), had two reasons to be happy that she was right again.

From the July 1967 of Teen Set magazine