Press Releases

•  Yearbooks reveal previously unseen photographs of celebrities at school and college
• Photos include Natalie Portman, Leonardo DiCaprio, Madonna, Paris Hilton, Will Ferrell, Sean Penn and Jennifer Lopez
• ALL images available

Today Ancestry.co.uk, the UK’s number one family history website, announced a huge expansion of its online school and college yearbooks, which includes a wealth of embarrassing school photographs of today’s film and music superstars (images available upon request).

Yearbooks containing images of Natalie Portman, Leonardo DiCaprio, Madonna, Paris Hilton, Will Ferrell, Sean Penn and Jennifer Lopez all feature, and include information on their classes, school activities and candid photographs they’d rather forget – including Paris Hilton photographed as the school’s ‘Finest Girl’ and Madonna before her days as a blonde.

There are now more than 155 million records available in the U.S. School Yearbook collection, included in over 35,000 books from high schools, junior highs, academies, colleges, and universities from almost every US state from 1884 to 2009.

As well as reminding us of the interesting fashion decisions made by generations past, they contain information on almost all aspects of the school lives of students, dishing the dirt on the current A-listers, including:

• Natalie Portman – Academy Award winner and Star Wars star, Natalie attended Syosset High School in Long Island where she graduated in 1999. In her leavers yearbook, her friends have supplied pictures of Natalie as a toddler, including one of her dressed as a doctor.
• Leonardo DiCaprio – DiCaprio is most famous for his role in Titanic and several Scorsese-directed hits such as Gangs of New York, The Departed and Shutter Island. In the 1991 yearbook for the Los Angeles Centre for Enriched Studies, Leo is pictured in the ‘thinkers pose’ – having a joke at his own expense.
• Madonna – Born Madonna Louise Ciccone, a teenage ‘Madge’ is pictured in the 1975 yearbook for Adams High School in Rochester Michigan. Her creative streak is clear in many of her performing arts pictures, but most interesting is a glimpse of Madonna before she began her life as a blonde.
• Paris Hilton – The socialite and heiress features in entries spanning several years in a number of schools, most notably her picture from 1995 when she was voted ‘finest girl’ in her high school.
• Will Ferrell – TV and Film funny man best known for his appearances on Saturday Night Live and his role as Ron Burgundy in Anchorman went to University High School in Irvine, California. He can be seen joking around at a pep rally in his school yearbook.
• Sean Penn – The double Academy Award winner most famous for roles in Milk and Mystic River can be found pictured in a number of yearbooks from Santa Monica High School, Los Angeles.
• Jennifer Lopez – Actress, singer and American Idol judge, ‘J-Lo’ can be found in her leavers yearbook of Preston High School, The Bronx, New York.

Ancestry.co.uk International Content Director Dan Jones comments: “These US year books are a great addition to our international collections of school and university records, and will allow millions to reminisce their school years as well as uncover the school lives of a relative.

“They also offer a glimpse into the younger lives of some of the world’s best known superstars before they hit the big time, and include some amazing photographs I’m sure they’d rather not see again!”

Click here to see the gallery featuring the US celebrities in their younger years.