If John Lennon had Yoko, Paul McCartney had Linda. The New York-born photographer was the mother of his children, his collaborator, bandmate, and basically his everything for nearly thirty years. When she died in 1998, he was heartbroken.
Since her passing, McCartney has accomplished a lot and has raked up a whopping $1 billion net worth, but finding love again was a battle. He married Heather Mills in 2002, but that marriage turned out to be a disaster.
It wasn't until 2011 that McCartney finally found love again in his third wife, Nancy Shevell, and she's proved to be the most reserved out of all McCartney's wives. But who is she, and most importantly do they make each other happy?
Beatles fans will certainly have something to say if she breaks his heart.
They Met Through Her Famous Cousin
It wasn't in McCartney's native England that he met Shevell. In fact, they met in the Hamptons of all places, on Long Island, as they each have properties there.
Their meeting and love story is something right out of a Lifetime movie. The mastermind behind their meeting and the person who introduced them was none other than Shevell's second cousin, Barbara Walters. Apparently, Walters had dinner parties where she would invite them both just so they'd meet.
"Barbara was her emotional confidante and played matchmaker," a friend of the McCartney's told The Observer. "She gave numerous dinner parties for them and always made sure to invite people she knew that Paul would want to meet."
Walters also allegedly "coached" Shevell on how to be "the opposite of Heather Mills," and trained her on how to behave towards him.
Calling Shevell her second child, Walters confessed that her cousin doesn't really like publicity and entered into her relationship with McCartney, in 2007, wanting to be as low-key as possible. They'd both just exited marriages and started to become inseparable. But there was no thrill in being spotted as McCartney's new girlfriend.
"She doesn’t want anything to do with publicity," Walters said. "She’s turned down a piece in Vogue. She doesn’t want anything to do with music."
The pair married in an equally low-key wedding, with only a couple of family and friends in attendance at London's Old Marylebone Town Hall. They've both been married before, Shevell to attorney Bruce Blakeman with whom she has son Arlen, so a big wedding (something like Kiera Knightley's in Love Actually) was never on the cards.
They did end up honeymooning at Mick Jagger’s private Caribbean estate though.
She Has Her Own Fortune
Shevell grew up in a Jewish household in Edison, New Jersey. Her father is Myron Shevell, the owner of New England Motor Freight (NEMF), and her family has been in the trucking industry since the '20s.
Back in the '60s her father and his brother started a business together but in 1975 they were charged with fraud and accused of working with the Mafia. The case never made it to trial but the business was ordered to shut down. Later that year, Shevell's uncle killed himself.
Myron bought NEMF in 1988 and was again accused of working with the Mafia and wasn't allowed to negotiate with the union for five years. Still, Shevell loved the family business, despite these apparent scandals.
She told The Newark Star-Ledger that she was involved in the family trucking company early on in life, and loved when her father would give her toy trucks as a kid. "I used to line them up in my room, right next to my Barbies. While other kids would go feed ducks at the park, we would go to my father’s truck terminals, to places like Pennsauken, every single weekend."
As a teenager in high school, she played on the girl's football team, and lists skiing, flying, Vermont, and "boobs" as her interests in her yearbook. Later on, she would become the only woman to major in transportation at Arizona State University.
In 1983, she joined the family business, and three years later was already the VP for administration in 1986. In 2001, she was appointed to serve on the M.T.A. board.
She has a net worth of $200 million, but it appears that she's as humble as her husband and still uses public transportation just like him, despite her fortune. According to her co-workers, she complains about how crowded transportation is at rush hour, ironically.
Shevell Says She's Really Not That Intriguing
One of the reasons why McCartney probably fell in love with her is because she's so low-key. She isn't looking for attention, giving tons of interviews on what life is like living as Lady McCartney. After being in the spotlight for his whole life, it must be nice to be with a person who enjoys privacy.
"It’s just not that intriguing," she told The Observer. "Not like his last marriage, which was really intriguing. I’m over 50. I work. That’s it. I haven’t been social and I have a small group of girlfriends. There really isn’t much to talk about."
Unlike his second wife, Shevell allegedly offered to sign a prenup before they were married, but McCartney refused because he knew she wasn't after his money. Even McCartney's children approve of Shevell.
Now the McCartney's are virtually inseparable and attend events and even protests together. Shevell is exactly what McCartney needed and if you're a big fan of his you probably appreciate that he's finally got a good enough companion. But we all knew McCartney would never say goodnight to love.