The Times of Malta has been a household name and a vade mecum since childhood.

My first lead letter in the Sunday was in 1963. It was called ‘Bikinis and the Tourist’. That was a time when Malta was trying to diversify its economy but when a tourist swimming in a two-piece costume could still be reported to the police and hauled to the nearest station. I saw that happening in Pretty Bay, Birżebbuġa and wrote that letter when I was in the ‘terza’ at the Lyceum. A measure of change in social mores is the fact that today most Maltese females swim in bikinis, as do tourists, without anyone batting an eyelid.

I had a very cordial, even friendly working relationship with subsequent editors especially Tony Montanaro and Laurence Grech, when the readership increased. 

I remember in particular my series of interviews in Geneva with the later Professor William Buhagiar of Qrendi, especially his accounts of Malaya and Ethiopia, as well as of Malta in the 1920s when his father was Head of the Ministry. These had been published as a four-part series. 

Another seminal interview I recall was that with M. Edgar Pisani about his adolescence in Tunisia in the 1930s before the War.

Then there were my articles which I started writing in Geneva just after Black Monday when the Times was savagely attacked by Mintoffian thugs, with impunity, on October 15, 1979. I had called these ‘The Historical Inevitability of Mintoff’s Downfall’, and later had them published in book form under a nom-de-plume as The Popular Movement for a New Beginning (Lux Press, 1981).

There were several topical and insightful articles, such as those relating to the Bush-Gorbachev summit in 1989, or Malta’s application to join the European Union (by de Marco to De Michelis); about the Cold War, the University of Malta, and various others arising from personal experiences in Albania, Belarus, Ghana, Zimbabwe, etc.

The Times served as a forum of public debate, across parties, and an invaluable opinion former. Its editorials usually commanded respect and were influential. 

The Times of Malta also retained English as an essential means of communication, thereby preventing Malta from becoming marooned in an insular linguistic nationalism.

Post-independence, this Times of Malta was a different product to its imperialist colonial past tending to equate nationalism with fascism. Equally, and mercifully, it upheld its firm commitment to democracy.

Henry Frendo is a historian and academic. 

This article first appeared in a commemorative supplement marking 85 years of Times of Malta. Contributions will be published online every day between August 11 and August 20. Read other contributions.