David Ervine: Progressive Unionist Party leader David Ervine, who has died aged 53, was a key political figure in Northern politics since the early 1990s. He was instrumental in bringing about the loyalist ceasefires announced in October 1994 and played a significant part in the negotiations which led to the Belfast Agreement in 1998.
As a former paramilitary who entered representative politics, he was not unique in Northern Ireland. But what made him stand out were his working-class politics and his drive to provide a constitutional alternative to the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) which he joined as a teenager.
He was reared in a red-brick two-up, two-down house on Chamberlain Street off Belfast's Newtownards Road in the shadow of the cranes of Harland and Wolff. The youngest of five, his parents were non-attending Presbyterians of strongly differing political traditions.
He often quipped that his father, Walter, an iron turner with an impressive British army record, was a socialist "to the left of Joe Stalin", while his mother, Dolly "was to the right of Genghis Khan" and a supporter of Ian Paisley.
It was his father's influence that left its mark both culturally and politically on the young David.
Walter, a cricket lover, would have thought little of crossing the Lagan to watch hurling in Casement Park in Andersonstown. While David's unionism was never in question, it melded with street-level socialism and an appreciation of cultures other than his own. Like his father, David was something of an intellectual underachiever and had a series of run-ins with school authorities at Orangefield High.
He left at 14 for a job at the Sirocco engineering works in east Belfast but "factory life didn't suit" and he opted for a storeman's job in the city centre.
With the start of the Troubles, the teenage Ervine resisted both the Orange Order and the lure of the loyalist paramilitaries except for stints as a community vigilante keeping watch against feared IRA attacks at the end of Chamberlain Street.
At 18 he married Jeanette, "the wisest, most sensible thing I have ever done", and seemed destined for a life of work and parenthood.
However, on his 19th birthday in July 1972, the IRA exploded more than 20 bombs around central Belfast, killing nine. It was Bloody Friday. Ervine watched plumes of smoke rising over the city from the upper lounge of a pub and concluded that he could only defend his community through attack - and he approached a known UVF figure and simply said: "I'm ready."
"I'll say little more than there was a swearing-in ceremony. There were others there and we had some training. I was pushed towards explosives." There then came an episode that people still talk about, but Ervine was always reluctant to provide too much detail. He was arrested transporting a bomb along the Newtownards Road in November 1974 and was eventually sentenced to 11 years in the paramilitary compounds at Long Kesh.
It was here he met loyalist leader Gusty Spence who became a political father figure. "On my first day, he asked me why I was in jail and I replied, 'Possession of explosives'. 'No', said Gusty, 'Why are you here'?"
The provocative question rocked Ervine who began to think deeply about his own "involvement" and to begin studying, including a few classes in Irish.
He sat O-levels, argued politics and studied the arts and social sciences. He appreciated what he called the "oxygen" of the compounds and Spence's company, shielded - as he was - from the mayhem on the outside.
On his early release in 1980 he again attempted to establish "normal" life. He became a milkman and later worked in a local shop, but the lure of politics meant he became active in the radical, if marginalised, loyalist Progressive Unionist Party. He was elected its leader in 2002.
He disliked the establishment character of the Ulster Unionists and the "big mouth" unionism of Ian Paisley. He stood for Belfast City Council in 1985, defying IRA death threats, but was unsuccessful.
His political activity continued with the drive for a loyalist ceasefire in the early 1990s, especially in the aftermath of the IRA Shankill bombing.
Following the cessations by the IRA and UDA/UVF in 1994, Ervine was well placed to negotiate on behalf of loyalism in the talks leading towards the Belfast Agreement. His clear thought, plain-speaking style and personable nature earned him the plaudit from talks chairman Senator George Mitchell that "there is not a more impressive politician in Northern Ireland than David Ervine".
Close political colleagues insist the public failed to appreciate both the efforts he made to divert loyalist paramilitaries towards politics and the dangers he faced, probably at the cost of his health.
Unlike Sinn Féin, the loyalist parties have failed to break through into the political mainstream; paramilitaries remain active and arms have not been decommissioned.
Intense and bloody feuding between rival factions broke out despite Ervine's efforts.
Despite this he remained until his death a popular figure, especially outside the wider unionist community.
The warmth of the many tributes from prominent figures on both sides of the Border, from London and Washington bear testimony to that.
"I never fully understood just how much he had done to help people," said his son Mark. "When it's your time to go, it's your time to go, but people live to 100 and don't do half what my dad did."
David Ervine, born July 21st, 1953; died January 8th, 2007