Manjimup

Distinguished and Famous people from Manjimup

🌟 Marty Zambotto, known as Go-Jo

Marty Zambotto, who performs as Go-Jo, grew up in the Manjimup district before developing a pop career that reached an international audience. His single Mrs Hollywood attracted widespread attention online, and he represented Australia at Eurovision in 2025. A local ABC report captured the reaction of Manjimup friends and a former high-school teacher, who remembered a student already comfortable being himself. His first guitar had come from Toyworld, a modest beginning for a performer later touring overseas. The district connection is upbringing and schooling, with the local recollections giving the biography more life than streaming figures alone.

🏅 Matt Priddis

Matt Priddis began playing football at seven with Deanmill in Manjimup before his family moved to Perth. He later developed through Sorrento Duncraig and Subiaco, winning the 2006 Sandover Medal before becoming a leading West Coast midfielder. His AFL career included the 2014 Brownlow Medal and 240 games for the Eagles. In a firsthand account for a junior-football publication, he remembered the enjoyment of being part of a team in those early years. Those Deanmill beginnings were the first steps in a career built through several levels of Western Australian football.

🪵 Charles and Tom Bunning

Under the Bunning brothers’ leadership the company established a Manjimup workshop in 1946 and developed mills at the Tone and Donnelly rivers. Postwar demand for housing encouraged expansion and the production of pre-cut timber packages for homes. Charles brought engineering and milling experience, while Tom’s background was in accountancy. Their timber enterprise later diversified into hardware. It was also shaped by changing supplies and restrictions on native hardwood harvesting: the Tone and Donnelly river mills closed in 1978. The district’s connection is industrial activity and employment within that larger business history, rather than a claim that either brother was born locally.

🏦 Jack Gabbedy

Jack Gabbedy managed the Rural and Industries Bank branch at Manjimup from 1948 to 1953. His country experience helped bring him to the attention of those selecting the bank’s commissioners, although his promotion prompted parliamentary criticism. A rumour that he had been a minister’s campaign manager was wrong; the two had played golf together while Gabbedy was at Manjimup. As a commissioner he helped guide the bank’s expansion into a broader trading institution. He also wrote about group settlement and woodchopping. The Manjimup years connect his practical branch experience with a later role in the development of Western Australian banking.