20.09.2018
In From the Cold – Launch of Sailor, Airman, Spy – Memoir of a Cold War Veteran
There was standing room only on Thursday last (September 13) as family, friends and residents of Brabazon House attended the launch of a book by Whitechurch parishioner, Ted Hayes. Canon Horace McKinley launched Sailor, Airman, Spy, a memoir of a Cold War veteran.
Hugh St Ledger, the chief executive of Brabazon and his staff had prepared for a capacity crowd that included household names from politics, business and community.
In addition to attendees from Dublin a large contingent had travelled from Wexford where Ted and his late wife Annette had lived for more than eleven years.
Ted held the audience spellbound as he told them of his growing up in Dublin, his attendance at Mountjoy School, falling in love with his future wife Annette at the age of 13 and following the lure of the sea to become a sailor. He told how those years as a sailor had brought him to one his favourite places Waterford, up along the coast of the UK, to the Arctic and back. He recounted joining the Royal Air Force and after training as a linguist found himself posted behind the Iron Curtain in Berlin as a spy at the height of the Cold War in Europe.
In launching the book Canon McKinley, quipped that as the book’s title included the word “spy” he intended “to refer to Ted from here on in, not by his Christian name – but quite simply, as 007”. He spoke of Ted’s time as a volunteer on Mater Hospital Radio and his work with the Mission to Seafarers. He said Ted’s book contained some extremely valuable and significant social and political (with a small “p”) history too. He urged those present to buy an extra copy to give it a sister, a brother, a daughter, a cousin, an aunt, an uncle, a neighbour or a close friend as a Christmas present.
Sailor, Airman, Spy, Memoir of a Cold War Veteran by Ted Hayes is on sale at Brabazon and in bookshops nationwide for €10. Proceeds from the sale of the book will be donated to the Brabazon Trust.