`An Empire in Decline," is how Ted Dwyer, a successful Cork businessman, captioned the second chapter of his book, Don't be Afraid to Dream. True, there's nothing remarkable about businessmen writing books, but this businessman is from a family which had a seminal influence on Cork.
The Dwyer dynasty is gone but it was a dynasty, and in its heyday thousands of Cork people knew secure, pensionable employment. By the middle of this century, the population of the city was just over 100,000. Some 6,000 were employed by the Dwyers. The claim that the city's prosperity was linked to the vision and innovation of the Dwyer family is a hard one to refute.
Dwyer & Co of Washington Street, the Lee Boot factory and the Sunbeam factory in Blackpool were what singled out the family in its ability to make a difference to what was then a very close-knit community. The Dwyer clan rode the crest of a wave and brought many others with them. And then the tide went out.
Ted Dwyer has told it as it was. It was a time of benign management - too benign, perhaps - including long liquid lunches, golf and the social milieu. It was the era of the merchant prince.
The employers were the benefactors - and seen as such - while the employees were loyal to them. But it was a time of ominous flux. Significant indeed were the successes of that golden era and, as the Dwyers prospered, so too did the Cork economy. But it was not to last.
He writes: "Many theories were advanced for the decline in the family fortunes, but my belief is that changing trade terms precipitated the demise. Relaxed management cannot be discounted either for the business failures, because hunting, fishing, golfing and shooting seemed to be just as important as work. Our family's financial circumstances changed from being very well-off to being quite poor in a relatively short span of just under two decades.
"It was a culture shock that must have been especially difficult for my parents to handle," the author tells us. He goes on to describe how his father severed his links with the family business in 1974 and found himself left with nothing except the home in which he was living at "Lover's Walk" in Cork. There was no severance settlement, no pension.
Dwyer the elder, known to one and all as John, but William J. on the official documents, was forced to sell the imposing family home and move to a smaller one in order to to provide for his future income.
"Dwyer & Co was controlled by two branches of the Dwyer family, and things were not working between my dad and the other side, probably because my father was not pulling his weight. There were long lunches and, by 1960, he had a drink problem that took him a long time to get under control. In fact, it was only 20 years later that he regained control of his full dignity.
"By then, he was without employment - with all the strains that imposed. The fact that he could overcome his weakness in such trying personal circumstances speaks eloquently of his strength of character."
THE downturn in his father's fortunes brought home to Ted Dwyer how important it was to have a pension plan. "My father had held one of the top jobs in Cork and had a pension plan arranged by an accountant. But when times became difficult the pension, which was actually a savings policy, was needed. The proceeds were spent so, eventually, the only income available was from the State," he wrote. John Dwyer died in 1990 but, after a chequered career, he had the satisfaction of seeing his sons prosper.
While the book is a personal reminiscence, it is also much more than that. Dwyer has used it as a vehicle to share his business philosophy - a considered one - with the wider community. As the founder of City Life Pensions Ltd he has adopted the motto: "Work smarter, not longer. When you are working, work. Take time to rejuvenate, to smell the flowers. Take time to dream, because dreams come true."