Hi Frank,

I saw your article on starwarsautographnews.com about Mark Hamill giving autographed photos to young fans at Celebration. You mentioned in the article that you’d like to hear about it. My 5 year old, Declan, was one of the lucky young padawans that was given one of those autographed photos. I attended Celebration all 5 days, and on the last day, I brought my wife and Declan with me. It was the first Celebration for all of us and here in our hometown of Chicago to boot. Declan has been a fan of Star Wars and Luke specifically since he could walk and talk, partly based on seeing my love for Star Wars. In fact, he has chosen to dress up like Luke Skywalker every Halloween since he was 2 (see attached photos). He was dressed like Luke from ANH on Monday at Celebration as well, which perhaps drew the attention of Chris Argyropoulos from Lucasfilm in the first place. So here’s how it went down….

We were making our way to the Phantom Menace Panel. I had given my Jedi VIP badge to my wife and son so they could take advantage of the shorter line into Wintrust and get seated. It was cold outside. I took my wife’s Monday badge and waited in line outside. When they got inside, they were walking across the floor in front of the stage to make their way to some seats up front. They were approached by a man wearing all black with a black hat and black backpack. He introduced himself as an assistant to Mark Hamill and said that Mark was sorry he couldn’t make it to Celebration this year and that he signed a photo that he’d like my son, Declan, to have. My wife didn’t know if it was legit at the time or not, but she said that he was very polite and looked like he may be official. He then asked if it would be ok to take a photo of Declan holding the autographed photo, and my wife said yes. She said the guy was impressed that Declan was dressed as Luke Skywalker. After that, he said thanks, and my wife and son went to find their seats. When I got inside and found them, they were both super excited. My son couldn’t wait to show me, and he was also showing all the other fans sitting around us. A nice couple sitting beside us gave him a protective sleeve so the photo wouldn’t get bent. I wasn’t sure if it was real or not, but at the time, I was just happy that it had made my son so excited and happy. For the rest of the day, he kept talking about it and wanted to show it to people. He kept saying “I’m Luke too” and wanted to pose as Luke at the Hasbro booth (see attached photo). It made for such a great experience and memory for sure.

A few days later, I was on Twitter, and I saw Mark Hamill post about the autographed photos. To my amazement, I saw my son, Declan, in one of the 3 tweets that Mark had put out. I knew for sure at that point that it was real and was so thrilled that Declan’s photo was in the tweet too. It was also in that tweet that we figured out that the man in black that had given the photo to my son was Chris Argyropoulos, a publicist for Lucasfilm. Mark had included his handle in the tweet. I showed Chris’s photo to my wife, and she confirmed it was him. I replied to Mark’s tweet and let him know that my son was one of the lucky young fans. Chris liked my reply as did many more fans. As of this afternoon, more than 7,000 people have seen my reply to Mark’s tweet. I also posted a follow up reply showing my son posed as Luke at the Hasbro booth. That reply also has a couple thousand impressions. Amazing to say the least and just icing on the cake for a great memory and great experience at Celebration. It’ll be hard to top this for sure, and my son will forever have this memory from his first Celebration.

Thanks for allowing me to share our story!

Brian Brooks