The huge crowd which attended Tim Duggan's funeral - as large a funeral as there has been in Limerick for years - showed what a much loved man Tim always was. Had he seen the crowds himself he would probably have said there were more than half-a-million people there - Tim was not given to understatement.
Perhaps it was the zest for life which sometimes led him to exaggeration that made him such splendid company and such a popular companion to his very many friends. The stories he told and the stories about him were legion.
When Another Row won the Naas November handicap by the shortest of heads in a driving finish with three other horses involved and Pat Eddery riding the runner-up, Tim's description of the result was: "The easiest short head in the history of racing."
Playing golf, leading the Limerick Insurance Institute Team against the Cork Insurance Institute, Tim was playing a then leading Irish international playing number 1 for the Cork team. Tim described graphically how his opponent gave his tee shot on the first in Killarney everything he had. The shot finished some 30 or 40 yards off the green. Tim's response? "I stood up, took it nice and easily and drove the green." Tim was that sort of man.
His childhood was marred by separation from his parents who then lived in England and wished to spare their family the horrors the World War had brought. How harrowing it must have been for all of them. When the war was over he came to live in his beloved Limerick and went to school in the Crescent College.
His academic prowess was perhaps best described as adequate and Tim had many reports of the "could do better" variety, but it was at the Crescent College that his love and interest in sport grew and with it that enormous loyalty to his friends that remained throughout his life.
Tim was a fine golfer playing out of his favourite courses, Limerick and Lahinch, where he was for so many years a hugely popular member. He captained many Limerick golf teams with varying degrees of success and his love of the game never faltered until his final illness.
On leaving school he joined the Hibernian Insurance Company where he worked for some years in Dublin before returning to join its office in Limerick. The manager then was the late Bill Dennehy, the office manager was Joe Mulqueen and their three intrepid inspectors were Gordon Wood, Hugh McMahon and Tim. What an eventful office it must have been!
After some years Tim commenced a new life as a broker - a calling he followed with enthusiasm for the rest of his life. His career was not entirely on the centre of the fairway - bunkers were visited once or twice; but with his customary panache and aplomb he emerged unscathed each time. In his insurance career he made many lifelong friends in Limerick and far beyond.
In 1965, his brokerage flourishing, he married "the girl next door". Mary remained his devoted wife until the day he died showing a love for him that never altered. They were blessed with three sons, all of whose careers Tim and Mary followed with the greatest of interest.
In recent years Tim's business was taken over by McDonagh Boland (now AON). He worked in a consultancy basis but his interest in insurance remained unabated. How sad it is that Teddy McRedmond, then the head of that firm, visited Tim in hospital only days before he himself was struck down.
Tim was a very keen racing enthusiast and owned some truly fine horses - some on his own, some in partnership with Steve McDonagh and others, all of whom became and remained his close friends. His trainer was Andrew McNamara and he enjoyed some spectacular successes.
Tim's other abiding love was rugby. To say he was a committed follower of Old Crescent would be to commit an understatement of which he would certainly not have approved. Even when the club was going through what Picasso might have called one of its blue periods, Tim thought several of its players should have been on the Irish panel.
Tim faced his illness with extraordinary bravery and dignity and with the hope that his deep belief and faith in God provided. He was supported by the unwavering loyalty of his sons and by an extraordinary exhibition of love and devotion from Mary whose sense of humour in the most trying times enabled her to bear the ordeal with enormous fortitude.
Tim died in St Vincent's Hospital in Dublin and Mary and his sons are entitled to feel the most enormous pride in what they did for him to ease his passing. How hard it is for all of us to realise that the unfailing good humour, the laughter, the stories and the exuberance that he brought to life have been so tragically ended. How terrible it must be for Mary and his sons.
Among the many tributes paid to him at his funeral especially by Fr McNamara and others it is perhaps best to finish with what Joe Donnellan, in his eulogy, so aptly quoted from Hamlet:
"Goodnight, sweet Prince
And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest!"
G.A.H.