Some small ads in newspapers are simple looking-for-love declarations by a given person hoping to meet someone they could strike up a relationship with. And then some small ads are a little broader in their scope, like the one Brian O'Connell brought to our attention on Today with Claire Byrne. This seemingly-humble ad actually hid an epic story of war, romance and a lifelong search. Here's Brian's description of the ad: 

"In this case, the ad I saw was fairly simple. It was looking for a named person, born in the 1930s and they said they were trying to trace them or members of their family and then they gave a contact email."

So far, so ordinary. Then Brian got to speak with Mike, the person who placed the ad and things started to become a lot more interesting. Mike, who lives in England, is trying to find his biological father. His mother had been an au pair with the family of an American army officer in Korea in the late 1950s. When the conflict there was ending, his mother booked passage home on a ship called the Canton and while onboard, Mike's mother struck up a relationship with a member of the crew. When she got home, Mike's mother realised she was pregnant:

"She met somebody at a local dance. They obviously had a bit of a fling and she then announced to him that she was pregnant. Obviously, in those days it was not a good thing to be pregnant and single for a young lady. So, he thinking he was the father, did what you did in those days and he married her."

Mike knew none of this until he was an adult and once he found out the truth, he decided to try to find the man his mother met on that voyage home from Korea.

"When I was about 20, I found out that the person I thought was my father wasn't."

And he's been trying to trace his real father ever since. The revelation came in a conversation he had following his parents' break-up. He didn't get a lot of detail about the man his mother had met back in the 1950s because she was reluctant to revisit what she must have thought of as a past indiscretion.

"She was aghast that I'd been told and said it didn't matter, it was all in the past. There was this sense of shame and embarrassment about the whole situation."

It took a long time, but Mike did manage to get his father's name from his mother and that meant he was able to begin his search. And one of the more intriguing facts he found out was that his father was born in Cork in the 1930s. And although he knew putting the ad in the newspaper was a long shot – no one replied, apart from Brian – he remains optimistic:

"I wouldn't expect a response the same day. They’re going to have to go away and have a think about how they're going to respond to it, if it is them, you know, whether they want to make contact or whether, you know, want to leave that in the past. And I fully understand that."

The good news for Mike, obviously, is that he now knows he's half Irish. You can hear Brian's full report on Mike's small ads search by going here. 

Niall Ó Sioradáin