It was a lovely day in the mid 1960’s. My wife Nora and I had a nice lunch in Copenhagen Café on Rathmines Road near the Stella Cinema. Remember the Stella? I spent my childhood and older years enjoying great movies there.

After our lunch we went across to the old H. Williams for some shopping and it was there I saw Dick Haymes. We were astounded to see him looking rather shabby and down at heel.
To younger readers let me explain. Dick Haymes was a major movie star and singer. In the 1940s and 50s he worked for 20th Century Fox and recorded for Colombia and Capitol Records.

Dick was born in Argentina of an Irish mother. He went to Los Angeles in the late 1930’s and sang with the Harry James big band. He was tall, handsome and a great singer and of course Hollywood snapped him up.

He had six wives, among them a young Rita Hayworth (pictured left). During World War II he was called up for service but he refused to join up as he was from Argentina. Uncle Sam never forgot this and had their revenge by deporting him after many court cases in the mid 1960s.
Dick came to Ireland and lived in Rathmines and ended up doing gigs in north of England clubs. He really had fallen on hard times– from Hollywood hills to a bed-sit in Rathmines. I don’t know how he kept his sanity.

Some time later the Irish State gave Dick Haymes an Irish Passport as his mother was Irish and this enabled him to get back to America. However, he never regained the popularity he had in the 40s and 50s.

I am delighted to say Capitol Records have issued a two-CD set of his work, which includes such songs as ‘It Might As Well Be Spring’, ‘The More I See You’, ‘The Very Thought Of You’ amongst many others. It is wonderful CD and I warmly recommend it.

Dick Haymes died in 1980 in Los Angeles. His funeral was sparsely attended, what a truly terrible fall for a genuinely nice man. Thank God we can still see his movies such as ‘State Fair’ on DVD and enjoy his magnificent baritone voice on CD.