California Couple Gifted 150 Celebrity Letters for 70th Wedding Anniversary

— -- A California couple celebrated their 70th wedding anniversary, and George Clooney, John Travolta, Regis Philbin, Olivia Newton-John, Steve Garvey and all the living U.S. presidents wrote to send their congratulations.

Those luminaries, however, did not even make it to the top of the list for the groom, Richard Arambula. His favorite is a special blessing from Pope Francis.

“I treasure that one quite a bit,” Arambula told ABC affiliate KERO-TV in Bakersfield. “I’m sure possibly they sent many of those out but the way it’s worded means a lot to me.”

Arambula and his wife of 70 years, Mary, 86, have their granddaughter to thank for all the high-profile notes and gifts.

The granddaughter, Belinda Banister, lives in Germany and began the project about a year ago, she told KERO.

“First we wrote the Vatican, then we got a response and then we started thinking who else? If we can get this, we got the president, we got the pope, who else can we get. And it just went from there," Banister said.

The Arambulas were married in 1944 when Richard was 17 and Mary was 16, they told The Bakersfield Californian. They have four children, 13 grandchildren, 18 great-grandchildren and 8 great-great-grandchildren.

The family celebrated the Arambulas’ marriage last week, at which time they were presented with the celebrity well-wishes, which also included items from Rod Stewart, Judge Judy, Shaquille O’Neal, Ed Asner, the Dallas Cowboys and the Los Angeles Lakers and Dodgers, the Californian reported.

"It blew me away. I didn't expect it, I surely didn't expect it," Richard, 87, told KERO.

One of the more touching gifts came from the late Joan Rivers, who died in August. In her memory, Rivers’ team sent the Arambulas a brooch and a shawl.

“I never expected anything like this,” Mary said of the whole experience. “It was a big surprise.”

Banister called it “insanity” that so many well-known figures responded to her request.

"We thought we would maybe get 10 responses,” she told KERO. “We thought we would have a lot of agents tell us they don't do that. We had some of those, but we never dreamed of getting 150 responses.”