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George
met second wife Olivia at his US record company, A&M.
Olivia, a Mexican-American secretary who was slim and with glossy black
hair, had been hired to look after the star while he was in Los Angeles.
Her parents, a dry cleaner and a seamstress,
were immigrants and lived a hand-to-mouth existence in the city caring for their five children.
But after getting to know
George in Los Angeles in 1974, Olivia agreed to move to England with him.
It was a turbulent time for him following
the collapse of his marriage to Patti.
At first, Olivia felt isolated and friendless
Things were to change when she
gave birth to the couples' beloved son, Dhani
Four weeks after the birth in August 1978, George and Olivia were married
in a civil ceremony
The couple, who had both converted to Hinduism, drove to the register office in one of his Rolls-Royces
Explaining
the success of the marriage, Olivia said: "Probably because George and I both come
from working class backgrounds our values, our beliefs, are the same."
Despite
sunning the limelight like her famously reclusive husband, Olivia launched the Romanian Angel Appeal in 1990 which helped
to take convoys of equipment to the children suffering in orphanages.
The campaign raised more than $1 million
Olivia has admitted in the past that her world revolved around
George and their son. She said: "First and foremost, I am a wife and mother."
And she showed her mettle protecting her husband when George was attacked by a knife-wielding schizophrenic in 1999
In
fact, it was Olivia who was credited with saving his life.
Crazed Michael Abram broke into George's mansion, Friar Park, in Henley, Oxfordshire, and beat him with a table
lamp and stabbed him at least ten times while threatening to kill him.
But Olivia bravely fought him off, hitting him over
the head with a brass poker and a table lamp.
Dhani, 23, who had rushed in from the lodge in the grounds where he lives,
held his blood-soaked dad in his arms and pleaded with him not to die.
He said:
"He was drifting. He looked so pale in the face and he was groaning and saying, 'I'm going out'. He made little sense and
I knew that he was loosing consciousness. It was about ten to 12 minutes, although it seemed like a lifetime, before the paramedics
arrived. When they did, I felt my father had already passed away"
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