Bennett's of Ballinacurra Descriptive List (Ref. B609)

B609/

Crawford (B609/1/B/5). The firm, as a result, was often reliant on Guinness’ assistance in obtaining supplies from elsewhere in Ireland, and abroad (e.g., B609/9/A/36). During the Great War and in subsequent years the firm also had to deal with increased wage demands from workers and the threat of industrial action (B609/5/A/4). Despite his generally unyielding stance, however, Bennett managed to avoid an all-out strike until December 1928. Even then, he and his staff, with the assistance of volunteers from the Royal Munster Yacht Club, managed to dry the crop, Bennett refusing to discuss terms with his workers until this work was completed. In his diary he noted ‘Thank God this trouble is over the only strike that has occurred here in living memory or for many years probably 100’ (B609/9/A/48). From 1919 to 1922, Bennett also had to contend with the danger to his firm, and to him and his family, arising from the War of Independence and the Civil War. In October 1921 he ‘gave a gratuity to Volunteers for protection of property and preservation of order’ (B609/9/A/41). The firm emerged from this period relatively unscathed, and continued to prosper in the years up to Bennett’s death, although he foresaw adverse consequences in Guinness’ decision to open a new brewery at Park Royal in London (opened in 1936; B609/9/A/59). Following the death of his only son, Jack, in the Great War in 1915, Bennett was much concerned with finding a partner for the firm and possible successor (see, e.g., B609/9/A/50). None of the candidates worked out however, and while Bennett did not appoint a successor before his death, he had changed the firm into a company limited by shares in 1928, with his second wife Esther Bennett, her daughter Dorothy McNeill, and his daughter from his first marriage Gwendoline Bennett all made shareholders (B609/4/A/1). Gradually, Dorothy McNeill, Bennett’s stepdaughter, who had started as his secretary in 1928, came to take control over the company, initially in close collaboration with her mother (B609/4/C/1). This transition occurred at a difficult time, with the quantity of barley grown locally in Cork in sharp decline, making the firm increasingly reliant on good relations with Guinness (B609/2/D/1). Fortunately, as her stepfather had done, Dorothy McNeill quickly forged good relationships with important figures at the brewery (B609/9/E/1-2). Another advantage was that both grain prices and maltsters’ wages were both now agreed nationally, removing the volatility of previous years (B609/1/A/37, B609/4/F/12). Mrs West maintained the strong relationship between the firm and Guinness, as well as its close involvement with the Cereal Station. In 1939, the firm began malting for the brewery at Park Royal (B609/1/A/21, B609/9/E/4). Throughout the war years she had to contend with emergency powers provisions affecting imports of coal (for drying barley) and exports of malt (B609/1/A/23-27), as well the effects of a ‘black market’ for barley in parts of Cork (B609/1/A/26; B609/9/E/6). Further successes by the Cereal Station in the 1950s in developing important new varieties of barley required close cooperation between the firm, Guinness, and the Station in the distribution of pedigree seed (B609/1/A/35, B609/7/A/22). In 1951 a further reorganisation of the company occurred, with Guinness becoming the majority shareholder, and with a board of directors and a management committee created,