British Pioneer of submarine communications cables, and Founder of Cable and Wireless. He began his career as a textile merchant and owned a warehouse in Manchester. In 1865 he became the joint founder of the Anglo-American Company, which was formed with the intention of laying the first successful transatlantic submarine cable. He secured the future of the project by pledging his personal fortune of £250,000, enabling it to be completed in 1866. He went on to found and finance many more companies, including Eastern and South African Telegraph, Australasia and China Telegraph and the Pacific and European Telegraph Company which later became Cable and Wireless. He was also active in politics, being a Liberal Member of Parliament for Totnes from 1862 until 1866 and for Wick Burghs from 1872 until 1885 and again from 1892 until 1896. By the time of his death, at age eighty, he controlled companies worth £15 million, which owned 73,640 nautical miles of cables. (bio by: js)  Family links:  Children:  John Denison Pender (1855 – 1929)* *Calculated relationship