Famous Visitors To Your School/Workplace?

[pete9012S]

I think the most famous visitor we had was Emlyn Hughes,the England and Liverpool footballer.

He came to award a charity raffle for a football signed by the whole Liverpool team.

My classmate Joe was the biggest Liverpool fan ever and his Dad sent him in with money to buy an enormous amount of raffle tickets.

Emlyn came in,announced the raffle and then picked the winning ticket.
69....There was a loud roar behind me as young Joe realised he had that ticket,amongst tons of others he had bought.

He went up to receive his glorious prize....only to discover on closer inspection that he actually had ticket 96 and was reading it upside down.

Even our normally very strict headmaster looked so sorry for the crestfallen Joe.

The prize winning ticket was actually bought by a very quiet demure girl from the younger classes.

Over to you for your school's famous visitors!

[Courtenay]

In 1996, my first high school had a visit from Drew Ginn, the youngest member of the Australian men's rowing team (the Oarsome Foursome) who had just won gold in the Olympics earlier that year. He had local connections — his father was a real estate agent in our town and his grandparents were our next-door neighbours when I was little — so it was a bit of excitement for the lovely but otherwise unassuming region of South Gippsland, Victoria. I don't remember anything of what Drew said in his speech to us, but a lot of us went up for his autograph afterwards and he let us hold his Olympic gold medal, which we all thought was pretty cool!

Just found out that he's since gone into cycling as well: Rowing champion Ginn set for 24-hour cycling record (haven't found out whether or not he was successful!)

[Darrell71]

6 or 7 years ago Kiran Bedi came to my previous school. In my current school a lot of people who are locally famous have visited.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kiran_Bedi

[Dinah Cunningham]

In my primary school we had the visit of a well known novelist Franz Hohler (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franz_Hohler" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;).
He wrote a story with us who is very crazy but funny.
In my next school we went to the capital and we visited one of the 7 minister we have in Switzerland.

[Anita Bensoussane]

The only visitor I recall coming to my school was author Alison Morgan, who came to my junior school. She wasn't very famous but she was a "proper author" and I got her signature in my autograph book. We read some of her books before she came and she gave us a talk and answered our questions. I quite enjoyed the titles I read (At Willie Tucker's Place, A Boy Called Fish, Ruth Crane and maybe a couple more) but I remember very little about them now.

[Domino]

Pete, surely if you read 96 upside down, it's still 96?

Dave

[pete9012S]

Yes,you're right Dave.It must have been another number that could be misread upside down.
Unless Joe was dyslexic.

It was so sad.He was walking back to his seat in the main hall clutching his precious ball,absolutely beaming with joy when he was called back to the front and had to hand it back again.

[Stephen]

We had the children's authors H.E.Todd, Nicholas Fisk and Phyllis Arkle, and the illustrator Alan Barker (Bubble and Squeak) come to our school. But the most famous celebrity was undoubtedly Johnny Ball who opened a school fete. Nine years old, I was pretty tongue tied when I queued up to get his autograph.

Years later, I can sort of claim to having a drink with Johnny. I went with a friend's family to his sister's school where Johnny was hosting a quiz. During the interval, he came and sat at our table. My friend's parents were chatting to him as though he was your regular man in the street. But I was just as tongue tied as before!

[Darrell71]

We also had Saumya Swaminathan, a popular and talented chess player. Then a minister or some other political figure visited.

[Machupicchu14]

What we have the most is the team that won the All Ireland 'so Final. Mostly sport, but we had also have very important people, great writers, a famous quartet (I can't remember the name) and Sean OSé, a famous singer and a Soprano, which I liked the most.

[Moonraker]

Yes,you're right Dave.It must have been another number that could be misread upside down.
Unless Joe was dyslexic.

Possibly 61!

[Bannerman65]

Some of the Harlem Globetrotters once visited a primary school I went to. Not sure now, but I think one of the Globetrotter was Geese.

[pete9012S]

Wow!
I don't think anyone is going to top getting a visit from the trots.

[Bannerman65]

This was 38 - 40 years ago though, Petus. That's why my memory is hazy, over which of the Globetrotters came.

There were only about, 3 - 4 Globetrotters, as I recall, Petus. And they did sign the back board, to a basketball hoop, as well. What happened to it, especially after almost 40 years, I don't know.

I was also privileged to see the Harlem Globetrotters at the Perth Entertainment Centre, in 1985. Sweet Lou Dunbar, and Lynette Woodard, are the 2 Globetrotters I remember from the line up. The Globetrotters did win, but I no longer remember the final score, much less who the opposing team was.

Also, The Perth Entertainment Centre was demolished, in late 2011. A new entertainment venue, called Perth Arena, was build in it's place.

[floragord]

Margot Fonteyn visited to talk about a career in ballet, a huge excitement for all of us who did classes though I don't know of anyone who eventually trained, and Michael Ramsay, then Archbish of Canterbury, was much more interesting than we'd anticipated - think he only came to the school as one of the Sisters was his relative . The prizes were given out one year by the Duchess of Kent. After our time the author
C S Lewis gave a talk, I would have liked to hear that!