Michael Madsen, Vinnie Jones and Richard Chamberlain will star in the forthcoming Irish feature film Strength and Honor set in the contemporary world of boxing in Cork. During a break in filming Michael came to kiss the stone to get the gift of the gab or possibly to help him with his Irish accent!!

The guys were filming in Europe and rolled into Ireland, in the summer of 2005! On top of their list of things to do was visit Blarney Castle, where Senior kissed the famous Blarney Stone!

Rolling Stones front man Mick Jagger has locked lips with a few celebrities in his time.....the Blarney Stone being one of them!

The episode, titled In The Name of the Grandfather, sees Homer and Grampa travel to a village called Dunkilderry in order to fulfil a longstanding wish of Grampa's to have one more beer in a bar where he spent the best night of his life. One they get there, however, Abe Simpson discovers that the place isn't exactly as he remembers it. Homer and Abe also find the time to visit the Giant's Causeway, the Blarney Castle and, fittingly, the Guinness Brewery.

Raised in rural Pennsylvania with no formal education and nearly bankrupt by the time he was 30, Milton S. Hershey went on to found America's biggest confectionery company and earn respect as a great philanthropist. He also kissed the Stone while travelling in Europe. But what fascinates us is this. All agree that he got the idea for the chocolate making that made his fortune at the 1893 World Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893. As you'll read elsewhere, the biggest draw at that exposition was a two-thirds scale model of Blarney Castle. And look to the left at what he called his early products. It does make you wonder.

In 1947, we appeared in a famous advertisement for Canadian Club. As the copy put it, "Kissing the Blarney Stone was almost my Goodbye Kiss... " "I was hanging head down to kiss the Blarney Stone for its traditional gift of eloquence," writes Gene Patterson, a friend of Canadian Club visiting Ireland. "Suddenly the Irish guide holding my legs relaxed his grip. Only my firm hold on the guard rails saved me from a possibly fatal fall. Shaken, I crawled to safety, and used my new found 'eloquence' to tell the guide I could get along better without him." Clearly a tall tale - do we blame the Stone or the whisky?

Winston Churchill visited in 1912. We'll just stick to the facts this time. He kissed the Stone. He became the greatest orator of the twentieth century. You can fill in the gaps...

Two of cinema's best loved characters visited Blarney early in the twentieth century. It's no surprise to us that they were amongst the few that successfully made the transition from silent movies to talkies. They did kiss the Stone.

Bob Darch is one of the true legends of Ragtime and has probably travelled more miles than any other artist to spread the joy of the music. On a visit to Blarney nearly fifty years ago, he even managed to get a piano onto the battlements by the Stone. Don't ask us how. We didn't ask why.

Billy Connolly added a little to our worldwide recognition when he filmed here on his World Tour of England, Ireland & Wales. And can he tell a story...

Bernice Pauahi was born on December 19, 1831 in Honolulu, Hawaii to high Chiefess Konia and Paki. The great granddaughter of King Kamehameha the First, Pauahi was the last direct descendant of the Kamehameha line. In her Will, Pauahi committed more than 378,500 acres of her inherited Kamehameha lands to the establishment and maintenance of Kamehameha Schools an incredible educational legacy. She visited Blarney in 1875 and wrote - in italics - that she kissed the Stone "three times"!

Elizabeth Jane Cochran was best known under her pen name, Nellie Bly. An early investigative journalist, she pioneered undercover reporting working for Pulitzer’s New York World. In 1888, following the success of Jules Verne’s ‘Around the World in Eighty Days’, the World sent her off to do the same. She succeeded in just over seventy two days - the first woman to travel around the world unaccompanied at all times by a man. She became a great heroine for women everywhere. Her trip was hard work – remember this is long before air travel – and encompassed England, France, Italy, Hong Kong, China, Colombo, and San Francisco – and many points in between. We are very proud that kissing the Blarney Stone was one of her first objectives; they do say she could talk her way out of any situation on her trip...

You'll read elsewhere on the site of the importance of Scott's visit to Blarney but it was not free of controversy then. In his Journal of 1826, he writes "The city of Cork send my freedom in a silver box. I thought I was out of their grace for going to see Blarney rather than the Cove, for which I was attacked and defended in the papers when in Ireland."

Tom Horan, who played for Australia against England in their first Test Match in 1877 was born "within jaunting-car ride of Blarney Castle". Later captain of Australia, his real fame came from his writing, particularly his often-quoted historic account of the inaugural Ashes Test of 1882, in which he played. "The very papers which, in dealing with the first day's play, said, in effect, that the English cricketers were the noblest, the bravest and the best; that, like the old guard of Napoleon, they would never know they are beaten, now turn completely around, and, with very questionable taste, designate these same cricketers as a weak-kneed and pusillanimous lot, who shaped worse than eleven schoolboys." Some things never change but clearly he had kissed the Stone.