Brendan O'Regan: Irish Visionary, Innovator, Peacemaker

Mary McAleese, President of Ireland, succinctly captured the character of Brendan O'Regan as follows: 'a true visionary who leaves a legacy that permeates throughout all levels of economic, social and cultural life in Ireland'. This authoritative biography of O'Regan sets out that legacy in a well researched and compelling narrative. It is essential reading for anyone seeking a well-founded and original perspective on the evolution of Irish industry, aviation and tourism over the last seventy years. It also provides an assessment of O'Regan's important, but largely unheralded, role in the promotion of peace and reconciliation in Ireland. His efforts in this area, over more than thirty years, led Mark Patrick Hederman, former Abbot of Glenstal Abbey, to assert: 'he [O'Regan] more than any other individual person ...laid the foundations for peaceful co-existence between the different traditions on this island and between Ireland and England.' Author, Brian O'Connell, and collaborator, Cian O'Carroll, knew their subject well through Shannon Development (SFADCO), the regional development agency O'Regan first headed. With good foresight, they persuaded him, at the age of eighty-seven, to record orally his personal memories of the events and the many prominent personalities in Ireland and abroad he met and dealt with. O'Connell's biography combines this oral account with interviews of nearly 100 of Brendan's contemporaries and extensive original material from Irish state archives. It makes an invaluable contribution to the history of those transitional years between the era of creating statehood and modern Ireland.