Working as an electrician has always been a popular choice of career. You learn a skilled trade and the work is varied, rewarding and frequently challenging. However, not everyone who trains as an electrician stays "on the tools." Many individuals who've gone on to be famous in other fields began their working life by apprenticing as an electrician before that lightbulb moment when they realised their true vocation. Some of these selections may shock you, but we're sure that you'll find them illuminating and that they may spark some interesting conversations.

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2. The founder of Solidarity and the president of Poland
from 1990 to 1995 was originally a humble electrician.
Indeed, when Wałęsa lost the 1995 election, he
announced his intention to go back to his old trade at
the Gdańsk shipyards, though he eventually opted for
a lucrative career on the international lecture circuit.
Wałęsa graduated as a qualified electrician in 1961
and began work in the shipyards six years later. His
illegal trade union activities and involvement in strike
organising led to his persecution by communist
authorities and the secret police. He was fired in 1976
but continued as a jobbing electrician, though his
union activism meant that he was frequently laid off
and spent long periods out of work. In 1980, Wałęsa
was instrumental in bringing about the Gdańsk
Agreement and founding Solidarity, Poland’s first
independent trade union under communist rule. Two
years later, Solidarity was banned. However, in 1983
Wałęsa was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize while
still trying to work as an electrician. His campaigning
eventually led to Poland’s first free elections in 1990
when he was elected president. A controversial figure,
Wałęsa was nevertheless instrumental in breaking up
the communist bloc and so ending the Cold War.
Lech Wałęsa

3. Renowned as one of the greatest directors and producers
in cinematic history, Hitchcock was known as the master of
suspense and a pioneer of unsettling psychological thrillers
with a highly distinctive style. The creator of classic films such
as Rear Window, Psycho and The 39 Steps was born in Essex
in 1899 and left school aged 16 to become an apprentice
electrician at Henley’s, a manufacturer of electrical cabling
and appliances. It was at Henley’s that Hitchcock’s creative
talent first found an outlet, as he contributed several
creepy short stories to the house magazine, the Henley
Telegraph.
Hitchcock went on to join the fledgling British film
industry in the 1920s and directed his first film in 1925. Lured
to Hollywood in 1939, he eventually made over 50 films, hitting
a creative and commercial peak in the 1950s. Known for his
innovative editing, long shots and characteristic themes
and plot devices, Hitchcock always worked closely with his
scriptwriters and enjoyed making cameo appearances in his
movies. His meticulous attention to detail would certainly
have stood him in good stead as an electrician, but the trade’s
loss was definitely cinema’s gain.
Alfred HitchcockAlfred Hitchcock

4. David Jason
The much-loved British actor, famous for his
roles as Del Boy in Only Fools and Horses and
Inspector Frost in A Touch of Frost, worked as
an electrician for six years before committing to
acting full-time. A working-class Londoner, Jason
longed to follow in the footsteps of his elder
brother by becoming an actor, but their father
insisted that he first learn a trade. By the late
1960s, Jason was a regular on satirical comedy
shows on radio and TV, and become a frequent
foil for the great Ronnie Barker. Between 1976
and 1985, the two starred together in the sitcom
Open All Hours, and in the early 1980s Jason
became a voice artist for animation studios
Cosgrove Hall, working on Danger Mouse, The
Wind in the Willows and other productions. His
most iconic role arrived in 1981 when he was
cast as Del Boy Trotter in Only Fools and Horses,
which ran for ten years. From 1992 to 2010, he
played Jack Frost in ITV police drama A Touch
of Frost. With other notable roles including Pop
Larkin in The Darling Buds of May, Jason hasn't
fallen back into his original trade yet.

5. He was the lead guitarist in the world’s most famous band
and an extremely talented songwriter in his own right, but did
you know that “the quiet one” in the Beatles originally worked
as an apprentice electrician at Blacklers department store in
Liverpool? George was already playing in a skiffle band with Paul
McCartney and John Lennon when he left school at 16 to become
an in-store electrician. This promising career was cut short, however,
when the Quarrymen evolved into the Beatles and started their famous
residency in Hamburg. This ended when Harrison’s age was discovered
and he was sent home for being too young to work in Germany’s
nightclubs. Nevertheless, by 1962 the Beatles had signed to EMI Records
and the rest is history.
After the Beatles broke up, Harrison enjoyed a successful solo career and was
known for advocating peace and love, supporting good causes and championing
Indian classical music. He also founded Handmade Films, which produced
classic movies such as Time Bandits and Withnail & I. In 1966, Harrison told an
interviewer that he got “dumped” from his electrical apprenticeship because
he “kept blowing things up.” Clearly his love of experimentation served him far
better in pop music than in the electrical field.
George HarrisonGeorge Harrison

6. The father of modern physics was actually the son
of an electrical engineer, and prior to developing
the theory of relativity and postulating that E=MC²,
he briefly worked as an electrician’s mate, running
cables and hanging electric lights at Munich’s
Oktoberfest. This was the first such event to be
electrically lit, with the power coming from a
steam-powered generator. The young Einstein had
to check that all the lights were working. His father
and uncle manufactured electrical equipment, but
the company floundered because they lacked the
budget to switch from direct current to alternating
current. The family then moved to Italy, where
Albert studied electrical engineering, but he soon
left and completed his schooling in Switzerland,
where he excelled in maths and physics. He
then embarked on a glittering academic career,
becoming the world’s most prominent scientist
and a noted pacifist, despite his work leading to
the development of the atomic bomb. He settled
in America in 1933 and lived there until his death
in 1955, by which time the name “Einstein” had
become synonymous with “genius.” Not bad for an
electrical school dropout!
Albert Einstein