The Inductees into the Irish Broadcasting Hall of Fame for 2013 are
Radio
JIM SHERWIN
Jim will be forever associated with RTE's rugby coverage both on radio and television. Despite his versatility it was his match commentaries on International and domestic games that will be long remembered. He also had stints reading the news on RTE TV and presenting quiz shows including Cross Country Quiz. He is often heard on nostalgia shows as the lead swimming commentator of Michelle Smith's tainted Olympic swims in 1996.
BRENDAN BALFE
Brendan was born in 1945 in Dublin. In 1964 he joined Radio Eireann and was heard on air until his retirement in 2010. From 1999 until his retirement he was in charge of music policy at RTE Radio 1. In 1986 he won a Jacob’s Award for the documentary series ‘The Spice of Life’ and from 1998 – 2001 he was the radio host for RTE’s coverage of the Eurovision Song Contest. In March 2008 Brendan presented the final RTE Radio programme broadcast on medium wave. In 2007 Brendan launched his autobiography ‘Radio Man’.
JOHN SKEHAN
After an early career in the Irish Army during the Second World War, John joined Radio Eireann in the early 1960’s. In 1962 following the launch of the new television service John moved to television from radio as a reporter on the programme ‘Broadsheet’. In the seventies he moved back to radio and in 1980 won a Jacobs Award for the series ‘Play It Again’. For many years John presented RTE Radio One’s long running series ‘Words and Music’ which was similar in style to BBC’s Desert Islands Discs. John passed away in 1992
Television
CHARLIE BIRD
Charlie Bird ( born 9 September 1949) was Chief News Correspondent with RTÉ News and Current Affairs until January 2009. He took up the role of Washington Correspondent, but prematurely returned to his earlier post in Ireland in June 2010. He retired from RTÉ in August 2012.
Charlie Bird was born in Sandymount, Dublin in 1949 and educated at Sandymount High School. In the late 1960s, Bird took an active interest in far left politics, being a member of Young Socialists. In this role, along with Tariq Ali of the International Marxist Group, he attended the funeral of Peter Graham of Saor Éire who was assassinated on 25 October 1971 in an internecine dispute. A photograph of the funeral shows Ali and Bird giving a clenched fist salute at the grave.
Charlie Bird was recruited into RTÉ by Eoghan Harris in the mid 1970s. For many years in the 1990s, Bird was the only point of contact between RTÉ and the Provisional IRA. He witnessed at first hand the ceasefires and the subsequent twists and turns of the peace process.
Charlie first story to bring him national attention was when he interviewed Fr Niall O’Brien in the Phillipines. On 6 May 1983, O’Brien was arrested along with two other priests, Fr. Brian Gore, an Australian, Fr. Vicente Dangan, a Filipino and six lay workers – the so-called "Negros Nine", for the murders of Mayor Pablo Sola of Kabankalan and four companions. The priests where held under house arrest for eight months but "escaped" to prison in Bacolod City, the provincial capital, where they felt they would be safer. Charlie interviewed Fr. O'Brien in his overcrowded prison cell on RTE TV. When Ronald Reagan visited Ireland in 1984, he was asked on Irish TV how he could help the missionary priest's situation. A phone call the next day from the Reagan administration to Ferdinand Marcos resulted in Marcos offering a pardon to Fr. O'Brien and his co-accused.
In 1998, Bird and his colleague George Lee broke the story about tax evasion at National Irish Bank which involved Beverly Cooper Flynn, daughter of former Government Minister Padraig Flynn and herself a former TD.
On the international front, Bird reported on both Gulf Wars and was in Syria for the release of Brian Keenan who had been held hostage in Beirut for many months. He was awarded an honorary doctorate from University College Dublin in 2002. Charlie was attacked during the riots that followed the ‘Love Ulster’ parade on 25 February 2006, suffering a fractured cheekbone, soft tissue damage and bruising. On RTÉ News broadcasts later that evening, he spoke of his personal experience—and of how his assailants had recognised him and called him an "Orange Bastard". Witnesses included Sunday Independent journalist Daniel McConnell, who reported on the event the following day. In 2008, a man pleaded guilty to violent disorder and assaulting Bird. He presented the Charlie Bird Explores series in 2006, 2007 and 2008. In this collection of documentary programmes, he visited the Amazon, the Ganges, and the Arctic.
On 7 October 2008, Bird was announced as the latest person to fill the post of RTÉ News and Current Affairs Washington correspondent. His first report as Washington correspondent was on RTÉ News: Nine O'Clock about US Airways Flight 1549. RTÉ received 30 complaints after he "failed to wear a suit and tie" on RTÉ News: Six One during coverage of the death of Ted Kennedy. Bird provided coverage from the 2010 Haiti earthquake in January 2010. A two-part documentary about his first year in the United States was broadcast later that month on RTÉ One. In it he spoke of his "madness" in moving to the country and his lack of contacts and recognition in Washington DC. At the end of the second programme, he announced he would vacate his Washington post. Early viewing figures suggested that the two programmes got viewing averages of 473,000 and 563,000 people. RTÉ cited Bird's “popularity” when asked about the large audience.
Bird returned to Ireland to take up his previous job of Chief News Correspondent with RTÉ in June 2010. He covered a high profile leadership challenge of Enda Kenny on his return. During August 2010, Bird began presenting The Marian Finucane Show. Charlie retired from RTÉ on 26 August 2012 deciding to take the redundancy package being offered by the state broadcaster as it attempted to cut its budgets. His last broadcast was presenting the The Marian Finucane Show on RTÉ Radio 1.
LARRY MASTERSON
Larry Masterson is one of the most established and respected producers in the business. Apart from RTÉ he has produced for Channel 4 UK, Discovery Channel US, Learning Channel US, Travel Channel and TG4. Some of his productions including ‘If I Should Fall From Grace’ have been syndicated internationally. He has also been the recipient of many awards and was nominated for a Cable/ACE award in America. He began at RTE as a researcher including the 1976 & Days programme ‘It’s A Hard Auld Station’ about the lives of people in the Sherriff Street community of Dublin. He completed four years as Executive Producer of the Late Late Show and has produced other shows including The Miriam Show with Miriam O’Callaghan, The Saturday Night Show presented by Brendan O'Connor and the six part series with Dermot O'Neill, Dermot's Secret Garden.
CATHAL O'SHANNON
Mr O'Shannon flew with the RAF during World War II - having joined with a forged baptismal certificate aged 16 - and later became a reporter with The Irish Times.
He also worked on the paper's London desk, where he met and married the love of his life, Patsy.
He was a journalist and documentary maker with RTÉ, filming the first deployment of Irish troops overseas on a UN mission to the Congo, among many other works.
But it is as a television presenter he is perhaps best remembered.
Terry Wogan described him as possibly Ireland's greatest television journalist and programmes - such as his interview with Muhammad Ali - became iconic pieces of television. Among his other notable achievements was the Spanish Civil War documentary Even the Olives are Bleeding.
Alternative
HUGH HARDY
Hugh Hardy was a well known pirate radio station operator who is more famously associated with Radio Carousel and its network in Dundalk, County Louth and KLAS in Dublin. Described as 'one of Omeath's most famous sons', Hugh was a member of the Louth 1957/58 squad, which brought the Sam Maguire Cup to the 'wee county' for the first and only time.
ALTERNATIVE RADIO DUBLIN 257
ARD was the first pirate station to really break the monopoly of RTE especially on the airwaves of Dublin. progressing from a hobby, garden shed pirate radio station, with the assistance of Bernard Llewellyn, ARD built specialised studios, introduced regular schedules and a playlist. The station provided a launching pad for many of today's radio and TV stars.
JIMMY GREELEY
Jimmy Greeley (born 12 July 1945)worked for 4FM until early 2012. Jimmy is a veteran of Irish radio having worked for many stations such as Millennium 88FM, RTÉ 2fm, RTÉ News and RTÉ Radio 1. In 1994 he joined Dublin's local station 98FM, presenting the weekday Morning News, alongside the Head Teena Gates. Greeley spent 14 years in that post. In 2006 he began a new show on the cable TV station City Channel called ‘On The Menu’. In early 2009, after spending 14 years as a newsreader, Greeley left 98FM to join Ireland's new national radio station 4FM, where he started off working Monday to Friday from 9:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m., before moving to the 11:00 a.m.-3:00 p.m. time slot. In May 2011, following a number of schedule changes, he returned to presenting Morning News and Sport. In January 2012, Greeley confirmed his decision to retire from radio broadcasting to concentrate more on voice imaging.
A NEW SIX PART SERIES HAS BEGUN TO AIR ON DUBLIN COMMUNITY TELEVISION.
This six part interview series looks at the momentous moments as the new Wireless Telegraphy Act came into force at midnight on December 31st 1988 and closed the majority of the pirate radio stations that were dotted across the country. In the series we chat to some of those iconic names in pirate radio many of whom are still on the air today. We hear stories of guns being put to DJ's heads at Big D, The US Ambassador to Lebanon rescuing Radio Dublin DJ's who found themselves in a war zone, the raids, the fun, the postman who was arrested just because he was delivering post to a radio station as it was being raided. The characters some of whom are no longer with us but are fondly remembered. Tune in each Friday at 7 on UPC Channel 802, Dublin Community Telelvision, AERTV or on Vimeo.
