Trivia

When television came to Ireland in 1961 he was appointed first Chairman of its state-run governing body the RTE Authority

The only person to have appeared on the American version of What's My Line? (1950) as a panelist, a mystery guest, and a host, filling in for John Daly in the latter capacity in a 1959 show.

He began work as an insurance clerk at £60 a year. As a side line he started commentating on sporting events but was caught out when one his bosses heard him and suggested he find other employment.

He played Danny in the film Night Must Fall.

He was an Irish radio and television presenter, employed primarily in the United Kingdom from the 1950s to the 1980s.

In 1946 he became a full-time freelance sports commentator, working for Radio Éireann, Ireland's state broadcaster.

He began his career as a clerk in an insurance office.

A funeral service was held for Andrews at St Anne's Church in Portmarnock where he had his home, and his body was buried in Balgriffin Cemetery to the north of Dublin. A memorial mass was held for him in Westminster Cathedral.

He was a keen amateur boxer and won the Irish junior middleweight title in 1944.

In 1950, he began presenting programmes for the BBC, being particularly well known for boxing commentaries, and soon became one of television's most popular presenters.

He was known for coming up with off-the-cuff linkings that did not work, such as: "Speaking of cheese sandwiches, have you come far?" This was parodied by the character Seamus Android on Round the Horne in the 1960s, performed by Bill Pertwee.

After months of illness during 1987, originally caused by a virus contracted during a plane journey, Andrews died from heart failure.

He hosted The Eamonn Andrews Show on ITV for five years.

Andrews was the first This Is Your Life subject on British television when he was surprised by the show's creator, Ralph Edwards.

He was a regular presenter of the early Miss World pageants.

In 1965, he left the BBC to join the ITV contractor ABC, where he was the first host of World of Sport and where he pioneered the chat show format in the UK.

He had recorded his last edition of This Is Your Life six days before on 30 October 1987. After his death, the show, and two others that had yet to be broadcast, were postponed until, with his widow's permission, they were broadcast in January 1988.

He is perhaps best remembered as the UK host and presenter of the UK version of "This Is Your Life", between its inception in 1955 and his death in 1987, when he was succeeded by Michael Aspel (who had also succeeded Andrews as the host of Crackerjack! more than twenty years earlier).

In the 1960s and 1970s he presented Thames Television's Today news magazine programme.

He was educated at Synge Street CBS.

Andrews also created a long-running panel game called Whose Baby? that originally ran on the BBC and later on ITV.

On 20 January 1956, he reached No 18 in the UK Singles Chart with a "spoken narrative" recording named "The Shifting Whispering Sands (Parts 1 & 2)", which was produced by George Martin with musical backing by the Ron Goodwin Orchestra, released by Parlophone as catalogue number R 4106, a double-sided 78 rpm record. The song later reappeared on Kenny Everett's compilation album The World's Worst Record Show, released in June 1978.

Throughout the 1950s, he commentated on the major British heavyweight fights on the BBC Light Programme, with inter-round summaries by W. Barrington Dalby.

Between 1955 and 1964, he presented the long-running Sports Report on the BBC Light Programme.

Andrews stepped down from the RTÉ Authority amidst a bitter political storm over what was seen as the controversial content of The Late Late Show. Before leaving RTÉ, Andrews defended the show as 'freedom of expression'.