The former deputy editor of The Irish Times, Mr Ken Gray, has died aged 76. Mr Gray, from Glenageary, Co Dublin, worked for more than 50 years with the newspaper in various posts, ranging from picture editor to television critic.
He was deputy editor between 1978 and 1991 and served on the board of The Irish Times Ltd between 1978 and 1998.
Paying tribute yesterday, the editor of The Irish Times, Mr Conor Brady, said: "All of us at the newspaper have learned with great sadness of the death of Ken Gray. We extend deepest sympathy to his wife, Hazel, and to his family.
"Ken Gray represented all that is excellent about Irish Times journalism. He committed his entire working life to the newspaper, and it owes him much."
Born in October 1925, Mr Gray was educated at St Andrew's College, Dublin, and joined The Irish Times in 1944 as a trainee journalist. He worked as a reporter and sub-editor before being appointed assistant editor of Times Pictorial, a weekly, photograph-based journal.
He wrote features and film and theatre reviews but was best known as an adventurous and gifted page-designer at a time when the craft was in its infancy in Ireland. His innovative approach to pictorial display was brought to bear on the Sunday Review, another former Irish Times publication of which Mr Gray was assistant editor.
In 1960 he was appointed as assistant to the managing editor and chief sub-editor of the now defunct Evening Mail, which The Irish Times had acquired at the time. In 1962 he was appointed picture editor, or "art editor", as it was known then, of The Irish Times, a job which involved the reorganisation and re-equipping of the photographic department. He subsequently took on administrative duties in other areas of the newspaper.
On his appointment to the newly created post of assistant editor (administration) in 1972, he assumed full administrative duties for the newspaper, including responsibility for labour relations in the editorial department.
He was appointed a director of the company and deputy editor in 1978, with special responsibility to the board for budgetary control and labour relations within the editorial department. He was a member of the group which planned the changeover from letter-press production to computerised photo-composition and supervised implementation of the change, which occurred without loss of an edition, between 1979 and 1980.
Mr Gray retired from his position as deputy editor in April 1991 but remained on the board of the company until March 1998.
For much of his time with the newspaper he continued to contribute directly to its pages, serving as television critic between 1963 and 1978.
Describing Mr Gray as "a supreme master across the many skills of newspapering", Mr Brady said: "He was a keen critic and a sharp, incisive writer. He had both an intuitive sense of design and a deeply developed knowledge of typography. Above all, he understood the commitment to the highest standards that is the tradition of the newspaper. He exemplified those standards."
Mr Gray died early last Monday at St Michael's Hospital, Dún Laoghaire, after a lengthy struggle with cancer. He is survived by his wife, Hazel, and their children, Linda, Sue and Alan.
He donated his body to medical science. A memorial service will take place at 11 a.m. next Friday, May 24th, at St Paul's Church, Glenageary.
