Gladstone and Disraeli were the fiercest political rivals. The vitriolic duel between Gladstone and Disraeli was nothing less than a battle to lead the richest powerful nation on earth. To Disraeli, his antagonist was an 'unprincipled maniac'. For Gladstone, his rival was 'The Grand Corrupter'. Victorians were electrified by the confrontation.

Tony Ryan was one of the greatest Irishmen of the twentieth century.

Ingenious, driven and sometimes reckless, his sheer spirit and adventurousness made him Ireland's Aviator. Born in a railwayman's cottage in County Tipperary he rose to enormous success. Ryan set up the airline leasing company, Guinness Peat Aviation (GPA), which quickly became the largest such enterprise in the world. But it famously crashed and burned and Ryan lost almost everything.

What remained was a little airline called Ryanair which was chronically loss making. Ryan set about turning Ryanair...