The death occurred on December 10th, 2000, of Mr Reginald (Reggie) W.F.T. Berkeley, CBE, JP, FCIT, FILT, Married twice, he was widowed for the second time a few years before his death which took place in his 94th year.
Born in Dublin, where he lived in Hollybrook Road until 1921 when the family moved to Belfast following his father's appointment in 1920 as general manager of the Belfast Steam ship Co. Ltd., part of the Coast Lines group of companies. In Belfast he completed his education at the Royal Belfast Academical Institution.
In 1927, he was appointed a cadet by Sir Alfred Read, the then chairman of Coast Lines Ltd. and spent three years in Dublin with the British and Irish Steam Packet Co. Ltd., then another of the Coast Line companies. Following that he spent a year with Harland and Wolff in Belfast and a further year with Coast Lines in Liverpool.
He was then appointed assistant manager of the Belfast Steamship Company in Belfast in 1932, gaining promotions throughout the years until in 1947 he was appointed general manager following the untimely death of his father.
In that same year he became a Belfast Harbour Commissioner and for five years between 1968 and 1972 was chairman of the board.
He served on the Liverpool board of the Coast Lines group until it was taken over by the Peninsular & Oriental Steam Navigation Company in 1971, finally retiring in 1972.
As well as being general manager of the Belfast Steamship Company, he was also managing director of Burns and Laird Lines and chairman of Anglo Irish Transport Company, both part of the Coast Lines group, which were also absorbed into P & O following the takeover in 1971.
During the course of his career he was chairman of the Belfast & North of Ireland section of the Shipping Federation, including membership of the Federation's London Committee, a member of the committee of the Mission to Seamen (non-Seafarers), the Northern Ireland Tourist Board, the London committee of Lloyd's Register of Shipping, the committee of the Royal National Lifeboat Institution.
He was awarded the institution's Gold Badge for Services to the Shipping Industry.
He was a founder member of the Northern Ireland section of the Chartered Institute of Transport, formed in 1945 and chairman in 1955.
During his long retirement, he maintained his keen interest in the shipping industry and the Northern Ireland section of the Chartered Institute of Transport, only retiring from the committee in 1996.
A keen golfer, he had been both captain and resident of Knock Golf Club and captain of Kirkistown Golf Club.
He is survived by a nephew and niece in Northern Ireland and a nephew in Dublin.
D.P.N.