I don’t think for a minute that Geoffrey Brindley, aka the ‘Bradford Jesus’, would agree to carry the London 2012 Olympic flame, but the Facebook campaign nominating him is a nice idea nonetheless.

As reported in the T&A, more than 8,000 people have signed up to the campaign pressing for Mr Brindley to be an Olympic torch-bearer.

For around half a century, he has pounded the streets of Bradford in his brown robe and sandals. As a child I knew him as the Merry Monk; I remember waving at him as he walked up our street. I once stood behind him in a queue at the Co-op and couldn’t resist peeking into his basket. It contained a bag of onions, in case you’re interested.

It looks like a pretty solitary existence; when it comes to social interaction, the odd wave to passers-by is about as far as he gets – my colleague once asked him for an interview and he ran away from her – so I can’t see him relishing a highly-pressurised moment in the international spotlight.

The Facebook campaign is, however, an affectionate tribute to one of Bradford’s best-known characters.

There were several eccentrics around when I was a nipper. Anyone else remember the Bow-Legged Bopper? The scrawny little old man, who was indeed bow-legged, wandered around Thorpe Edge estate wearing white flares with Bay City Rollers-style tartan up the sides.

Then there was Old Anna, the bag lady who used to sing in a deep voice in Bradford’s markets. She was also known as Russian Anna and Polish Anna, and the story going around our school was that she’d been in a concentration camp and was the victim of terrible Nazi experiments.

A few years ago, the T&A published some remarkable old photographs found in a skip near Anna’s home after her death.

In one photo she’s a young woman, smiling in a headscarf, with a group of people in a field; a simple rural scene soon shattered by war. Another photo was of a haunted-looking Anna in a uniform, a number printed beneath, on an identity card.

When I was at university, one of our neighbours wore military uniform, wellies and a tea-towel wrapped around his head and muttered cryptic phrases, as if he was a spy.

Last year, the Shipley Dancer was regularly spotted grooving his way around the Aire Valley. When approached by a T&A reporter, he simply smiled and danced away.

The world is a more colourful place with eccentrics in it. And, intriguing as they are, they’re often best left alone, to continue being men and women of mystery.