From Mick Jagger to Fidel Castro: Shannon Airport’s star arrivals in the frame at photographic exhibit

Shannon Airport’s celebration of 70 years since the first commercial transatlantic flight into an Irish airport has been marked with a photographic exhibition featuring the many famous people who passed through — and the one who didn’t.

The permanent exhibition, located in the airport transit lounge, includes images of more than 60 world famous faces and events that happened at the airport from the early years of operations right up to the modern day.

Former airport director Michael Guerin said the most important of all was the visit of Pope John Paul II in 1979, while the most controversial was Russian president Boris Yeltsin, who remained on board and left the then Taoiseach Albert Reynolds — who had flown in from Australia for the occasion — on the tarmac with the rest of the welcoming party.

Ann Coyne, 78, a retired airport worker, remembered American singer, actor, and film director Gene Kelly in 1959: “We called them VIPs but Gene Kelly was so pleasant. He almost glided around, he was very charming.”

A former airport director, Liam Skelly said: “It was an unbelievably busy place at the time. At one stage, with Pan Am airlines alone, there were 200 people employed here.”

Some of the famous and memorable events captured include visits by every US president from John F Kennedy to Barack Obama. Other global leaders who transited the airport were Nelson Mandela, Mikhail Gorbachev, Fidel Castro, and more recently, Chinese President Xi Jinping.

Religious leaders Pope John Paul II and Dali Lama also feature, along with Prince Charles, Princess Grace of Monaco, and King Juan Carlos of Spain.

Movie stars included Bing Crosby, Bob Hope, Marlon Brandon, Richard Burton, Richard Harris, and Peter O’Toole, while rock stars Mick Jagger and Bruce Springsteen also appear in the exhibition.