Renowned businessman Richard Branson shared today that his wife, Joan Templeman, has died. She was 80 years old and Branson’s partner of 50 years.
Branson is the co-founder of Virgin Group, a global investment and venture capital firm. He shared the news via Instagram.
“She was the most wonderful mum and grandmum our kids and grandkids could have ever wished for,” Branson wrote. “She was my best friend, my rock, my guiding light, my world. Love you forever, Joan x.”
Just yesterday, Branson shared a picture of the two captioned, “Love this photo of Joan.” Earlier in November, he said, “Everyone needs a Joan in their life.”
Branson and Templeman met when she was working in a ‘bric-a-brac’ shop in London. In an article on the Virgin Group website titled “Behind every man there’s a great woman,” Branson said “I fell in love with her from the first moment I saw her.”
“To win her heart, I had to persistently hang around the shop and buy countless objects before we started courting,” Branson wrote, adding that his favorite was an advertising sign for Danish bacon.
Two years later, Branson bought Templeman an island in the British Virgin Islands.
“We were still in the early days of Virgin Records and I definitely did not have the cash to buy it—but try telling that to a fool in love!” Branson wrote in a blog on their 44 year anniversary.
Necker Island, as it was named, is where the couple married in 1989. Their two kids, Holly and Sam, followed suit and were each wed there, too.
Holly serves as Virgin’s chief purpose and vision officer, and Sam is a co-founder of HiddenLight Productions, along with Hillary Clinton and daughter Chelsea Clinton. Both are co-founders of Big Change, a charitable trust under Virgin Unite.
The cause of Templeman’s death has not been disclosed.
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Ava Levinson
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