LONDON – A man who became the most beautiful woman in Ireland when she took him to see the Guinness World Records has died.
She was born in Kilkenny in 1921 and was married to an Irish-American who went on to become a successful entrepreneur.
The Dublin native died on Friday, her husband said.
She had been working on a book about her life for about a year when she was diagnosed with cancer in the early 1970s.
Her book, The Irish Woman, was published in 1990.
Her husband, a former journalist, was writing the story at the time.
It was a landmark book and she went on record to say that it was her greatest achievement.
She told the Irish Times: “My wife and I were at a restaurant one day, she said: ‘I have cancer.
You have to see my book’.
And I said: “Yes, we’ll do it”.”
We have not forgotten about her.
I have made a promise to her that I will write a sequel.
“She died at home on the Irish coast, her family said.
Her husband, who has been writing about his wife’s life for many years, said: ”She had a beautiful personality and I loved her.
She was a woman of great faith and humility.
She would say ‘it was a mistake’.”
She was also a great cook, but it is hard to describe how much of a perfectionist she was.
I remember one time she came in for a very long dinner.
She told us that she had eaten everything and left out the crusts and cheese.
It was just horrible.”
She was known for her ability to tell the story from her own life.
In her autobiography, The Heart of the Matter, published in the 1980s, she recalled meeting a man named David who was a former member of the British Army.”
David told me that he had served in the Army and had been killed in the war.
I went to Ireland to meet him in 1971, but I was in a hotel and was not allowed to see him,” she said.
After the war, she met David again in 1975, who had also served in World War II and had left Ireland.
She recounted that when she went back to Ireland, David told her that he could not see her and that she should marry him because she was his future wife.
David died in 2010, and she married him in 2006.
She died on Thursday in her home in a suburb of Dublin.
