It would be more apt to catalogue his many job titles under the words exceptional or outstanding. Lofty adjectives however would embarrass the man who doesn't believe the reporter should ever be the news.

This week, passing a rainy afternoon, the veteran journalist is on the other side of the notebook and, faced with the thought of a trip down memory lane, is wondering whether his anecdotes will be of any interest.

It's the incredibly modest approach of the man with a career spanning 40 years which makes our conversation so refreshing.
It was far from a structured career path which led the boy who grew up in Marlborough Street to the position of London Editor of the Irish Times.

The father of four suggests that a poor academic head for anything but English meant he could never see himself succeeding at much else.

"From my earliest days, deep down I had a hankering to be a journalist," says the former St Columb's College pupil.

"As a child I enjoyed Sundays. I'd be the first across to Melligan's paper shop on Creggan Road to get the papers. I loved the smell of the crisp new Sunday papers. I was always interested in news and what was going on in the world."

A lifetime away from the media degrees and qualifications which nowadays attract thousands of A-level students every year, it was an announcement at assembly in St Columb's which steered the then 18-year-old towards a career in news.

It was 1968 and the previously quiet city of Derry was soon about to be propelled onto the world stage.

"Before then nothing happened in Derry," says Martin. "There was an announcement in assembly that The Journal had a vacancy for a trainee junior reporter and I decided to go for it."

Eager to impress, with schoolbooks under his arms, the keen student made his way to the Derry Journal offices in Shipquay Street for a swift interview with editor, Tom Cassidy and Managing Director Frank McCarroll.

The transition from classroom to newsroom was rapid and the ambitious teenager was about to be given a baptism of fire into the world of reporting, sent to cover the Civil Rights march in Duke Street in 1968.
News footage showing a well dressed young reporter being hit by a policeman surfaces at almost every commemoration of the events which unfolded on 5th October 1968.

The reporter in question was the former 'College' pupil who had months earlier decided to apply for a vacancy with his local newspaper.
"None of us knew then that Derry was about to become an international news story," says Martin.

"The city soon become a magnet for journalists from all over the world. There were people coming and going all the time. It was a great time to be here and The Journal was a great place to learn on the job."

It was this introduction to the world of news which left a huge and lasting impression on the young reporter, as he recalls.

"At 18, I was thrown into an adult world. It was so instructive in a way that may not have been so for my contemporaries who were studying at university. I was going into situations where adults were involved. I was very much aware of the generation of Derry men in their fifties who might have been members of the Derry Trades Council or the housing action committees. None of these men would have had the opportunity to go to university but they were real men of intellect."

Spending a period of three years honing his talent in the Shipquay Street offices, the now experienced reporter began to get itchy feet. An itch he felt could only be scratched by working on one of the bigger, national newspapers.

By 1971, the trainee's eyes were wide open. From covering the 'Battle of the Bogside' to numerous shootings and bombings, this time he'd approach his prospective employers with the skills to back up his enthusiasm.

Following a visit to The Irish Times' Dublin office, a phone call a few weeks later heralded a move from Derry to Belfast to work in the broadsheet's Northern office.

It was very much a case of bigger paper, same old news, explains Martin, who quickly settled into his new role.

"The output of news wasn't that different because of the scale of events being covered. Leaving the Derry Journal I was writing about things like two people being shot dead or a bomb killing three people.
Moving to the Irish Times, I was covering the same kind of incidents."

While Belfast didn't represent a huge move geographically, the shift to the Irish Times' London office in 1973, where Martin would eventually be made editor, was to prove a major change culturally for the man who had been immersed in the heart of the Northern Irish situation during the initial years of his career.

"I was seeing the Anglo end of Anglo Irish politics. They were terribly bleak times," says the Derry man.

"I covered the start of the Belfast Ten trial, involving Gerry Kelly and the Price sisters. I was also there for the Guildford Four Trial in the Old Bailey and saw Gerry Conlon again when he was vindicated and charges were officially withdrawn at Belfast Crown Court. I was also there when the Birmingham Six were sentenced."

While staying behind the camera and out of the story has been paramount for Martin, who has delivered a number of lectures on journalism, he admits that being an Irish man in London in the eighties was a trying time, personally and professionally.

Alongside the challenges however, remained the determination and satisfaction of having done a good job.
"There weren't too many laughs in those days, God knows. Every Irish person was suspect in so many eyes. Birmingham was not a nice place to be the night the bomb went off. That was tough. They were demanding days but exhilarating and rewarding as well.

"The rewarding thing about newspaper work is that you go in in the morning not knowing what you might be doing but by the end of the day you've done something. That's a great feeling."

Despite more than holding his own in the tough world of London journalism, coming home was never far from Martin's mind. On his return to the North in the eighties, it wasn't difficult for the by now seasoned news man to pick up where he had left off.

Far from being blasé about the conflict on his home soil however, many incidents that were 'all in a day's work," remain with him.

"I heard a shot," says Martin, reflecting on the afternoon he stood in Miltown Cemetery where loyalist Michael Stone attacked the crowd, killing three people.

"No one else moved and I thought maybe I'd imagined it. Then another one came. Then I heard grenades go off. I was down on my mouth and nose instantly. I was lying on the marble chips of a double grave.

"Dodie McGuinness was the person in charge of the graveside ceremony. So there was me and all the other men on the ground and she was the only one standing telling people not to panic. I remember that so clearly. Awful times."

In 1991, deciding to take a break from the 'awful' situations, different prospects led the well travelled journalist back to Derry. Turning his hand to something completely different, Martin poured his energy into a number of promotional campaigns tasked with attracting people and money to the city including 'Impact 92.'

It wasn't long until the writing bug bit again however prompting the veteran reporter to return to his journalistic routes. Returning to the Irish Times on a freelance basis, the former Journal reporter got a chance he couldn't turn down when international news agency Reuters needed a man in Belfast.

As luck would have it the BBC were also looking for cover and soon Martin found himself with enough work to keep him going 24 hours a day.

From the Journal offices in Shipquay Street to the Irish Times, then the BBC and Reuters and, having covered most of the major news stories which came out of the North, the answer to the question about the high point of his career comes surprisingly easy to the prolific writer.

"It would have to be the Good Friday Agreement," says Martin, a cheerful smile replacing the look of melancholy left by some earlier anecdotes

"The world's press camped out on the grounds of Stormont," he continues.
"We were in portacabins, freezing cold. When we finally knew the deal was going to be done it was in the very early hours of Good Friday morning. It was a still morning, around 5:00am. There was very light snow on the ground. I saw Gusty Spence coming out the door for a walk. David Ervine was behind him. I shouted Gusty and asked him if there was going to be an agreement and he said there was going to be a deal.

"It was a high time, a very satisfying and demanding period. It was nearly like I'd gone full circle."

These days you're most likely to find Martin in any one of the University of Ulster campuses either lecturing or in his role as head of press there.

"It's all ended up sounding a bit bleak" he worries as our conversation comes to a close.

The son of commercial traveller John Cowley and his wife Frances McManus, a well known Derry teacher, the local boy who liked the smell of newspapers claims his late parents are responsible for the most crucial aspects of his journalistic training.

"They were wonderful people, and they knew the value of words. It's so important as a reporter to have the ability to listen and understand, it's in really listening and empathising with people that we do our best work."

Two cups of tea and a good few laughs later, we wrap up. As Martin hurries to another area of the university I make my way back to the office. The reporter in him hopes I'll get enough for my article.

The reporter in me thinks; conversations like these demonstrate the value of words.