John Lewis Ricardo (1812 – 2 August 1862) was a British businessman and politician. He was the son of Jacob Ricardo and nephew of the economist

David Ricardo David Ricardo (18 April 1772 – 11 September 1823) was a British political economist. He was one of the most influential of the classical economists along with Thomas Malthus, Adam Smith and James Mill. Ricardo was also a politician, and a ...

. In 1841 he married Catherine Duff (c.1820 – 1869), the daughter of General Sir Alexander Duff and sister of

James Duff, 5th Earl Fife James Duff, 5th Earl Fife, (6 July 1814 – 7 August 1879) was a Scottish nobleman. Early life Duff was the son of Sir Alexander Duff, younger brother of James Duff, 4th Earl Fife, and Anne Stein, the daughter of James Stein of Kilbagie and K ...

. They had one son, Alexander Louis (1843–1871), the first husband of Florence Bravo. In 1841 he was elected Member of Parliament for

Stoke-on-Trent Stoke-on-Trent (often abbreviated to Stoke) is a city and Unitary authorities of England, unitary authority area in Staffordshire, England, with an area of . In 2019, the city had an estimated population of 256,375. It is the largest settlement ...

as a Liberal, serving until his death. He was active in the repeal of the Navigation Acts in 1849.

Businessman

Ricardo was Chairman of the

North Staffordshire Railway The North Staffordshire Railway (NSR) was a British railway company formed in 1845 to promote a number of lines in the Staffordshire Potteries and surrounding areas in Staffordshire, Cheshire, Derbyshire and Shropshire. The company was bas ...

from 1846 until his death. In 1846, he and

William Fothergill Cooke Sir William Fothergill Cooke (4 May 1806 – 25 June 1879) was an English inventor. He was, with Charles Wheatstone, the co-inventor of the Cooke-Wheatstone electrical telegraph, which was patented in May 1837. Together with John Ricardo he f ...

founded the

Electric Telegraph Company The Electric Telegraph Company (ETC) was a British telegraph company founded in 1846 by William Fothergill Cooke and John Ricardo. It was the world's first public telegraph company. The equipment used was the Cooke and Wheatstone telegraph, ...

, the world's first public

telegraph Telegraphy is the long-distance transmission of messages where the sender uses symbolic codes, known to the recipient, rather than a physical exchange of an object bearing the message. Thus flag semaphore is a method of telegraphy, whereas ...

company, and Ricardo served as chairman until its merger with the International Telegraph Company in 1856. He was also a director of London and Westminster Bank. Ricardo was a leader of a group of businessmen who, in 1845, purchased the patents for the electric telegraph designed by Cooke and Wheatstone. Ricardo was Electric Telegraph's largest shareholder, and its executive chairman, for its first 12 years. His goal was to build a network that would distribute breaking financial news to his own newsrooms adjacent to all British stock exchanges—an information monopoly that would be valuable to speculators and investors. However, when the established telegraph companies formed monopolistic cartels and raised prices to newspapers, Ricardo secretly switched sides and campaigned for their nationalization.Roger Neil Barton, "The birth of telegraphic news in Britain," ''Media History'' (2010) 16#4, pp. 379–406

Publications

* ''The anatomy of the Navigation Acts'', Charles Gilpin, London (1847)

References

External links

*
John Lewis Ricardo
at ThePeerage.com

at ThePotteries.org
The Ricardo Album
at RicardoPhotoAlbum.com 1812 births 1862 deaths Politicians from Staffordshire British Jews Jewish British politicians Liberal Party (UK) MPs for English constituencies UK MPs 1841–1847 UK MPs 1847–1852 UK MPs 1857–1859 UK MPs 1859–1865 {{England-Liberal-UK-MP-stub

Businessman

Publications

References

Further reading

External links