More than a history book — 100 Years of News

Donal Musgrave

Marking Cork's designation as European Capital of Culture, it is the first publication of its kind in Ireland and has already received rave reviews.

High praise for the production has come from RTÉ's Gerry Ryan who, incidentally, read it in bed.

"It's a lovely publication", he said. "One of those moments when you can genuinely say that this has been extremely well put together, from cover to cover, spanning ten decades, you can dip in an out of it."

"It's very easy to read and extremely entertaining. A history book by any other name and yet with none of the drudgery and swamp that's usually associated with a history book. Just dipping in and out is an absolute delight, an absolute delight. I can heartily recommend this one."

Among the first to get their hands on the book were former Taoiseach Albert Reynolds and ex-British Prime Minister John Major, who were presented with the first copies by Irish Examiner editor Tim Vaughan.

Much more than a history tome, the book presents a year-by-year overview of news, entertainment and sport.

Giving a rich flavour of social, economic, political and religious change, it captures in graphic pictures and words the life and times of one of the most dramatic and crowded eras the world has known.

From cover to cover it represents a brilliant celebration, not only of the past 100 years but also of this newspaper's daily role in reporting it. Page by page, it's all there as it happened and as it was recorded in these columns.

Front pages are reproduced exactly as they appeared, together with photographs from our archives, many in colour, including the first colour wire picture published in an Irish newspaper when Ireland beat England 1-0 in Stuttgart on Sunday, June 12, 1988.

In contemporary reports of local, national and international events, history comes alive, from the sinking of the Titanic to Bloody Sunday; man's first walk on the moon; the death of Christy Ring; Sonia O'Sullivan's silver medal; the Betelgeuse explosion to the tsunami disaster last December.

From the deaths of Diana and Mother Teresa to the rise and fall of Taoiseach Charles J Haughey; the assassination of President John F Kennedy and the end of The Riordan's, RTÉ's longest-running show.

You can re-live the horror of Veronica Guerin's murder and the hunger strike of Bobby Sands; Ronnie Delaney's Olympic Gold Medal; Michelle Smith's Olympic shame; the outbreak of World War II; the Air India disaster; the repeal of prohibition.

And from the Rising of 1916 to the Shannon scheme; the Roy Keane episode in Saipan who shot JR Ewing and Munster's victory over the All Blacks it's all there.

Irish Examiner 100 years of News is published by Gill & Macmillan and is available in all bookshops at 24.99.