Obituary: Noel Hanlon – Independent.ie

Chomping on a large cigar, Noel Hanlon would be stripped into Eamon Farrell's bar on Ballymahon Street, Longford, order a large brandy for himself and drinks for employees he favored, make a few comments in a laughter-filled, high-pitched voice and then depart Albert Reynolds or some other prominent local figure.

That was Longford in the mid-1970s when Noel Hanlon was the fun-loving town plutocrat with the common touch.

In later years, through political connections and business acumen, he served for 20 years on the boards of state companies, culminating in a disagreement with the minister Seamus Brennan as president of Aer Rianta was marred by the "brandy and cigars" controversy.

The goal of the student is to achieve a level of achievement in the field of achievement. But what does he lack in finesse? .

Later in South Africa, where he died, Hanlon did not flinch from 'telling it as he is' when he puts an old acquaintance by chance in Cape Town.

The friend made eye contact with a balding figure that looked familiar and when he saw the smile, realized he was seeing Noel Hanlon without his customary wig for the first time.

"I had 22 of them (wigs)," Hanlon declared when they got talking, "and when I got to 70, I said to hell with that, and threw them all in the bin."

Noah Hanlon, who died last Saturday in Cape Town, surrounded by his family, was born in Longford on January 8, 1940. He attended St Mel's College in the town but left after his Inter (Junior) to work in his father's garage and filling station on the nearby Dublin Road.

There was talk that they fell out and he emigrated to Detroit to work for Ford before returning to Longford in 1960 to run the family business.

He then saw a gap in the market and in the mid-1960s, beginning with ambulances in an expanding factory adjoining the garage. Quite quickly, he built the business into a national and a decade, he was supplying 60 percent of the ambulances used by the NHS in Britain and consignments of Longford-made ambulances were put to good use in conflict areas of the Middle East.

Success in a flash car, live in a new Georgian-style house with a swimming pool and invest in property. But he always remained a blunt if at times generous, hard-edged self-made man.

When a majority of his workers went to his father's funeral in St. Mel's Cathedral, they found themselves docked at half-day's pay for their trouble. Hanlon, who had two-way glbad in his office. "I did not ask you to go – so you went on your own time and did not pay for things on your own time," he told them.

It was a minor manifestation of the disorder that lay ahead.

In 1988, a bitter industrial dispute broke out over a rationalization plan to stem mounting losses at the factory. Both sides have been entrenched with the claim to have been part of the workforce and have been tearing up staffing agreements.

With production halted and mounting losses, Hanlon and the company, N. Hanlon Ireland Ltd, on liquidation with debts of £ 1,361,007. It was a blow to its creditors, but a bigger blow to the town of Longford which had little or no indigenous industry. Hanlon himself had other business interests, including a clothing manufacturing business in Ballymahon called Manford, which closed in 1990 with debts of € 413,425.

Despite their contrasting characters, Noel Hanlon and Albert Reynolds and their wives, Fionnuala and Kathleen, were good friends, as were their families. There were seven children in the family and eight in Hanlon's family, seven daughters and the youngest, to his, Patrick, who now has an award-winning garage and supermarket on the site where his grandfather started in business.

Frank Carter and the selection of Albert Reynolds as the Longford candidate for the 1977 general election. Reynolds was elected to TD for the first time, he was elected agent for Reynolds and still they wrecked Hanlon's during the high-speed campaign.

He was appointed chairman of the VHI, who was almost a director of Aer Lingus in 1980. In 1992, he was appointed chairman of the VHI, which was almost a full-time job as two executives left in quick succession.

Before the fall of the Albert Reynolds' government, Hanlon was appointed chairman of Aer Rianta, the national airport authority. In 2002, there were claims that the company had $ 5,000 in "brandy and cigars" as a gift to the minister's office some years before. Hanlon's tenure ended two years later in a public disagreement between himself and the Fianna Fail Minister Seamus Brennan over his opposition to the government break-up of the monopoly airport.

"A lot of people will be delighted to see me go," he said in an interview with David Murphy in May, 2004. "I've been a 23 years old president.

Others did not think so and when he presented four directors of Aer Rianta with £ 9,000 as gifts in October 2004, the Labor Party was outraged. Hanlon then paid for the watches himself.

Hanlon had liquidated his investment company PNM Hanlon Ltd. in 2008, leaving him with over € 2.2m in a large property portfolio. He left Longford to live in Craigavon, Co Armagh with a new partner and their young and later moved to Cape Town.

He visited Longford last summer when he was suffering from cancer that eventually led to his death.

Noel Hanlon, who died at the age of 78, is survived by his nine children, his wife and partner. He will be buried in Longford after Mbad in St. Mel's Cathedral this Tuesday.

Sunday Independent