A Wirral school has unveiled a blue-plaque honouring its most famous old-boy - former Prime Minister Harold Wilson – to mark the centenary of his birth.
Although born in Huddersfield, Lord Wilson attended Wirral Grammar School for Boys in the early 1930s after his father moved the family to Spital.
Paul Roberts, Wirral Grammar’s community manager, said: “Harold never forgot his roots.
“We still have letters that he would send to staff asking for advice - even when he was Prime Minister.”
The former premier evidently left a lasting impression on the school and was its first head boy in 1934.
Mr Roberts said that during the 1980s, Mr Wilson – who was MP for Huyton - would often hold question and answer sessions at the Adelphi Hotel in Liverpool with pupils invited to attend.
He added: “Looking through the notes from those sessions, it is clear that he always had a tremendous sense of humour.
“One of the pupils remarked that Harold's name was inked on every desk in the school and he shared jokes with them about it.”
Lord Wilson once said of his school: "Coming from my kind of background teachers were the most important adults in my life."
The plaque unveiling ceremony was performed by Wirral South MP Alison McGovern, Ellesemere Port and Neston MP Justin Madders and TUC deputy general secretary Paul Nowak.
Both Mr Madders and Mr Nowak are former pupils while Ms McGovern was a student at Wirral Grammar School for Girls.
Ms McGovern said: “Harold was a pioneering Prime Minister who opened up the opportunities for the many in our country and it is a source of great pride that he went to school in my constituency.
“Many people were inspired by him and that is why it was great to have unveiled the blue-plaque on what would have been his 100th birthday to celebrate his achievements.”
Ms McGovern with her copy of historian Ben Pimlott's biography
Lord Wilson led the country from 1964 to 1970 and then again from 1974 to 1976.
He won four of the five general elections he contested and remained the Labour Party's longest-serving Prime Minister until 2005 when his record was broken by Tony Blair.
Readers of a certain age may remember him for his working man’s Gannex raincoat, his ever-present pipe and the phrase “the pound in your pocket” after devaluation in 1976.
On leaving the House of Commons after the 1983 election he was created Baron Wilson of Rievaulx, after Rievaulx Abbey in his native Yorkshire.
He died from cancer in May, 1995, aged 79.
He is buried at St Mary's Old Church on the Isles of Scilly, where he frequently holidayed with his family.
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