The Irish Times

A history

Mark O'Brien

Founded in 1859 as the voice of southern unionism, the Irish Times is now the authoritative newspaper of choice. Forced to make its peace with an independent Ireland in 1921, it was the bane of the censor during the Second World War and became the voice of liberalism during the 1950s. Reinventing itself as ‘the paper of record’ in the 1960s and becoming a Trust in 1974 the paper has always generated, and been at the centre of, controversial news stories. From the Mother and Child saga in 1951 to the Heavy Gang exposé in 1977, from the Bishop Casey scandal in 1992 to ‘Bertiegate’ in 2006, this book examines the history of the institution that is the Irish Times. Beginning with the foundation of the paper in 1859, the book combines memoirs, personal papers, archives, company records, interviews and the newspaper’s journalism to construct the first – and independent – history of Ireland’s leading newspaper.

Mark O'Brien is a lecturer in the school of communications in Dublin City University. He is co-editor of Political censorship and the democratic state: the Irish broadcasting ban (2004).