"3rd Baron Killanin" Michael Morris Hand Signed FDC Dated 1960 For Sale

Up for sale "3rd Baron Killanin" Michael Morris Hand Signed First Day Cover Dated 1960. 

ES-6515

Michael

Morris, 3rd Baron Killanin, MBE, TD (30 July 1914 – 25

April 1999) was an Irish journalist, author, sports official, and

the sixth President of the International Olympic Committee (IOC).

He succeeded his uncle as Baron Killanin in the Peerage of the United

Kingdom in 1927, when he was 12, which allowed him to sit in

the House of Lords at

the Palace of Westminster as

Lord Killanin upon turning 21.  Morris was born in London,[4] the son of Lt. Col. George Morris, an Irish Galway. The Morrises were one of the 14 families making

up the Tribes of Galway. During

the First World War,

Killanin's father was killed in action near Villers-Cotterêts, France, on 1 September 1914 while commanding the Irish Guards. His grandfather was The 1st Baron Killanin,

who served as Lord Chief Justice of the King's Bench for Ireland from

1887 to 1889. His Australian-born mother, Dora Maryon Wesley

Hall (1891–1948), was the second-eldest daughter of English-born James Wesley

Hall (1839–1901) and Australian Mary Dora Frederica Hall (née Dempster;

1864–1895). Wesley Hall was the first general manager of the famous Mount

Morgan Gold Mining Company Limited in the Colony of Queensland, Australia, from 1886 to 1891. He was born in Kington, Herefordshire, Great Britain, to Walter Hall, a miller, and Elizabeth

Carleton Skarratt. Lord Killanin's maternal grandmother, Dora Hall, was born

in Williamstown, Colony of Victoria, to

William Dempster, a bank manager, and Margaret Herbert Davies. Killanin was

educated at Summerfields, Eton College, the Sorbonne in Paris and

then Magdalene College,

Cambridge, where he was President of the renowned Footlights dramatic club. In the mid-1930s, he began his

career as a journalist on Fleet Street, working for the Daily Express, the Daily Sketch and subsequently the Daily Mail. In 1937–38, he was war correspondent during the Second Sino-Japanese War. In

July 1927, he succeeded his uncle to

become The 3rd Baron Killanin, which gave

him an hereditary seat in the House of Lords at Westminster as it was a peerage in the Peerage of the United

Kingdom. Lord Killanin married (Mary) Sheila Cathcart Galway, in 1945. She was the granddaughter of Henry Dunlop, who built Lansdowne Road Rugby Ground in Ballsbridge, Dublin, in 1872. Her father was Douglas Canon Lyall Chandler Dunlop, Church of Ireland Rector of Oughterard.

Lord and Lady Killanin had three sons: George ("Mouse"), and John ("Johnny"),

and a daughter, Monica Deborah.  In November 1938, the young Lord Killanin was

commissioned into the Queen's Westminsters, a

territorial regiment of the British Army, where he was responsible for recruiting fellow

journalists, including future Daily Telegraph editor Bill Deedes, and friends who were musicians and actors. He

reached the rank of major and took part

in the planning of D-Day and the Battle of Normandy in

1944, acting as Brigade Major for 30th Armoured Brigade,

part of the 79th Armoured Division. He

was appointed, due to the course of operations, a Member of

the Order of the British Empire (MBE). After being demobilised,

he went to Ireland. He resigned his TA commission

in 1951. In 1950, Lord Killanin became the head of the Olympic Council of Ireland (the

OCI), and became his country's representative in the IOC in 1952. He became

senior vice-president in 1968, and succeeded Avery Brundage, becoming President elect at the 73rd IOC Session (21–24 August) held in Munich prior to

the 1972 Summer Olympics. He

took office soon after the Games.

During his presidency, the Olympic movement experienced a difficult

period, dealing with the financial flop of the 1976 Montreal Olympics and

the boycotts of the 1980 Moscow Olympics.

Denver, originally selected to host the 1976 Winter Olympics,

withdrew and had to be replaced by Innsbruck. The cities of Lake Placid and Los

Angeles were chosen for 1980 Winter and 1984 Summer Games by

default due to a lack of competing offers. Killanin resigned just after the

Moscow Olympics in 1980, and his position was taken over by Juan Antonio Samaranch. He

was later unanimously elected Honorary Life President.