1. Sally Magnusson presents Tracing Your Roots on BBC Radio 4 and was one of the main presenters of the long-running religious television programme Songs of Praise.
23 Facts About Sally Magnusson
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Sally Magnusson is the eldest daughter of Magnus Magnusson, an Icelandic-born broadcaster and writer, and Mamie Baird, a newspaper journalist from Rutherglen.
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Sally Magnusson's maternal uncle, Archie Baird, was a Scottish footballer, who played for Aberdeen and St Johnstone.
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Sally Magnusson spent her early years in Garrowhill in Glasgow, before moving to Rutherglen, where she grew up with her younger siblings Margaret, Anna, Siggy and Jon.
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Sally Magnusson was educated at Laurel Bank School for Girls, a former independent school which later merged with another independent school, The Park School, to form Laurel Park School, itself to merge in 2001 into Hutchesons' Grammar School, in the city of Glasgow.
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Sally Magnusson studied English Language and Literature at the University of Edinburgh.
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Sally Magnusson graduated in 1978 with a first-class honours degree.
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Sally Magnusson later joined BBC Scotland to present the weekly TV show Current Account.
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Sally Magnusson moved to London to present Sixty Minutes, the BBC's successor to Nationwide, for network television.
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In October 1986, Sally Magnusson joined BBC One's Breakfast Time as one of the main presenters.
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Sally Magnusson commentated for the BBC on the funerals of the inaugural First Minister of Scotland Donald Dewar, Cardinal Basil Hume and Cardinal Thomas Winning.
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Sally Magnusson has presented many television programmes, ranging from Panorama to Songs of Praise.
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In 1997, Sally Magnusson returned to Glasgow and became a main presenter for BBC Scotland's news programme Reporting Scotland.
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Sally Magnusson shared the role with Jackie Bird and now Laura Miller and presents the programme's Thursday and Friday edition.
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In January 2025 it was announced that Sally Magnusson would leave after 27 years.
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Sally Magnusson is the author of Life of Pee: The Story of How Urine Got Everywhere.
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Sally Magnusson has written books about the Scottish runner Eric Liddell, who refused to run on Sunday due to his Christian beliefs, and about the Cornish Christian poet Jack Clemo and his marriage to Ruth Peaty.
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Sally Magnusson wrote the children's book Horace and the Haggis Hunter, which was illustrated by her husband, Norman Stone.
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Sally Magnusson married Norman Stone, a TV director, on 9 June 1984 in Baldernock, near Milngavie, East Dunbartonshire.
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Sally Magnusson is the mother of the Scottish film director Jamie Magnus Stone, and has three other sons and a daughter.
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Sally Magnusson has received honorary degrees from several institutions: in 2009 a Doctorate of Letters from Glasgow Caledonian University, in 2015 an honorary degree from the University of Stirling and from The Open University on 29 October 2016.
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Sally Magnusson was appointed Member of the Order of the British Empire in the 2023 Birthday Honours for services to people with dementia and their carers.
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Sally Magnusson was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 2024.