Alan's career, behind the counter and in the wee back office of this man's world of spanners and saws, files and wrenches, spanned the turbulent decades of the Troubles and the slow, stuttering settlement into peace and stability.

The family suffered their own tragedy. He was there in the shop when his brother, John, a Royal Navy Reservist married with a young family, was shot dead in cold blood behind that very counter by a gunman from a breakaway republican terror group. Pistol-whipped by an accomplice when he tried to give chase, Alan's jaw was broken and his teeth shattered.

He and his colleagues lived through the endless city centre bomb blasts, the late night keyholder call-outs, the constant tension and security presence. They adjusted to changing times, the collapse of heavy industry, the growth of out-of-town shopping and the influx of the big multiples. And, all the while, working hard to provide a service, support jobs and simply make a living.

John and Alan's grandfather, William McQuoid McMaster, started the business back in 1896 - a date still commemorated above the door, albeit in 1970s-style lettering, along with the slogan, 'The House for Quality Tools'.

A joiner at Harland & Wolff until he fell and broke both his wrists, William decided that if he couldn't use his tools he'd sell them. He opened a shop in Ann Street before moving to Church Lane in 1910.

"My grandfather died in 1936 and my uncles, William and John, and my father, James, took over and then passed it on to my brother John and myself in the Sixties," he explains.

In the days when the Yard employed an army of 24,000 men and Mackie's, Shorts and the textile mills shaped the workforce, business boomed.

Saws were sharpened and repaired on the top two floors of the imposing terraced premises, with 11 saw doctors sitting in rows, warmed by a pot-bellied wood-burning stove.

These days, in our modern throwaway culture, there's little call for that particular skill. The only Saw Doctors I'd ever heard tell of is the music band from Galway.

But, for Alan, it was all part of the fabric of his childhood. He recalls: "When I was 10 I used to come in from school in the winter and run upstairs to warm myself by the stove and quietly watch the men at work. I'd marvel at the way they'd finish sharpening a 12ft bandsaw, twist it into a coil and send it rolling across the floor."

Church Lane has always had bags of character and, here and there, traces of the old spirit of Belfast remains. From Miss Moran's specialist tobacconists, which began life as a boot and shoe shop back in the 18th century, to McMaster's which marries traditional, knowledgeable, friendly counter service with a modern mini-supermarket layout for the customer who likes to browse. Today, the tool shop rubs shoulders with a barbers, a Chinese hot food bar and a dot.com gardening business. And on the day I visited, along with local customers, the place was full of Polish construction workers buying tools for their work in helping build a new Belfast.

Alan's nephew Gavin, John's son, has now taken over as the fourth generation McMaster to run the firm, while his brother is a London-based artist.

Manager Jim Lowe, who joined the team after John's murder, keeps continuity.

Alan's children haven't gone into the business: daughter, Gemma, is a primary school teacher, and his son, Alistair, is studying law at Queen's University, Belfast.

As he embarks on retirement, he welcomes the work choice and opportunities open to young people today: "I don't think the modern generation works as hard as the generation before. We talk about the good old days - but some things were too hard years ago and I wouldn't like them to come back again."

The darkest days of his life came with the murder of his older brother, John, in July 1991. "He was in the RNVR with HMS Caroline and was shot dead in the shop as he worked by what I believe was a republican splinter group, apparently because of the Navy's involvement in the Gulf War. Even the IRA condemned his killing. A total waste of a good man, for a mistaken ideal."

From the back, Alan thought the first shot he heard was a lightbulb exploding. Rushing further into the shop he saw a gunman aiming down behind the counter though he couldn't see his victim.

It was all over in seconds and the cordite choked the air. As the killer turned to leave, something in Alan clicked. "I thought, 'You're not coming in here, shoot someone and just walk away'. It was nothing to do with heroism. It was instinct." He ran after him but a second gunman smashed him in the face with his weapon, breaking his jaw and shattering his teeth.

The shock, grief and slow, painful physical recovery nearly felled him but there was nothing else for it but to go on.

He says: "The time after that was the worst of my life, for months I didn't finish work until one or two in the morning but I couldn't give up because I had a family and 13 people depending on me.

"Other people have suffered more than I have, but if the man who pulled the trigger could see the suffering that he causes for years afterwards, he might think again.

"I've letters of sympathy at home that I've kept, signed 'a good Catholic'. Others said they knew, liked and respected my brother from coming into the shop and condemned his killing - adding that they couldn't put their name to the letter because of the area they live in. It's tragic. But that sort of support helped us carry on. It was just such a waste. Neither of us were political at all. We weren't brought up that way. My father had always brought us up to treat everyone with fairness and dignity and refused to discuss politics or religion in the house.

"The first day on the job, well before the Troubles broke out, I remember my father taking me aside and saying we serve everyone in here, Orange and Green, black and white, they are all treated the same and we give exactly the same service and courtesy whether someone is spending 10 bob or £50."

Keeping a city centre business together in a bombed-out Belfast during the height of the Troubles was hellish. Alan admits: "It certainly was the darkest time of all our lives, looking back on it. It probably marked myself and a lot of other people for life.

"Even the routine stuff - hanging around for hours in a bomb scare, then back to work and hoping the searchers with their sniffer dogs had done their job properly. Being called out in the middle of the night two or three times a week as a keyholder in the area because of alerts.

"We lost a lot of our social life, even our peace of mind. You don't want your children to live through that."

Life, as he says, is too short. As his last hours in the job tick by - pointedly, the office clock has hands in the style of scissors - Alan is inclined to dwell not on the sorrows of the past but on the good times and the colourful characters he has known.

He loved the Belfast humour of the shipyard men. The tales, for instance, of the fitter who became a foreman and thereafter refused to answer to his name Sammy. "It's Sammy no more," he pompously told an over-familiar former workmate, "It's Mr Smith to you from now on." He was known as Sammy Nomore round the yard from that day on.

Even today there's a familiar figure round Belfast who, tired and emotional, regularly sticks his head round the shop door and yells "I didn't do it". Known to all as "Jimmy I Didn't Do It."

And the time Alan's mother, standing in behind the counter, tried to send a customer who asked for a 'bolster' to Anderson and McAuley's bedding department. To those in the know, the man was after a big metal chisel.

The shop has a language all its own. A 'footprint' - a plumbers' wrench with the eponymous symbol on it. 'Bastard', or rough, files. You can even buy bubbles for a spirit level. But no one has ever been sent to McMaster's for 'a long weight (wait)'.

As he closes the door on one era in his life, aged just 57, Alan steps through another portal into a future full of possibilities. " My wife, Jennifer, being used to me out early to work and not back till after 7pm, says she hopes I won't be hanging about at home all day, under her feet, " he laughs.

There's not much chance of that. Not one to sit idle, he plans to get involved in volunteer work in Romania through the church. He'd like to devote some time to his love of languages - maybe even take that degree course he might have followed had he not gone into the shop. And, as a couple, they'd like to travel.

A natural raconteur, he'd love to write a book based on his memories of the incidents and characters that peopled this fast disappearing world of hard graft and Belfast history. Someone should take him up on it.