His Worship the Mayor, Mr. Edward Henry Penny, J.P., has occupied a seat on the Blenheim Borough Council since December, 1899, and is now (1905) serving his first term in the Mayoral chair. He was born in the year 1859, at Stockport, Lancashire, England, where he was educated at the Grammar School, and was afterwards trained to business under his father, a wholesale paper merchant in Manchester. Mr. Penny came to New Zealand in 1883, but, after spending a few months in Wellington, returned to the Old Country. He, however, came again to New Zealand in 1884, and settled in Blenheim in 1885. For several years he was employed at the Marlborough Farmers' Co-operative Stores, and in the year 1893, he purchased a general stationery business, which he has since conducted with considerable success under the style of Stationers' Hall. Mr. Penny is a member of the Wairau Hospital and Charitable Aid Board, and of the Blenheim Borough School committee, of which he has been chairman since 1901. He is a local preacher of the Wesleyan Methodist Church, teacher of the senior class in the Sunday school, and was for several years superintendent of the Sunday school. In 1904, he went to Melbourne as one of the delegates to represent New Zealand at the General Conference of the Methodist Church of Australasia. Mr. Penny married Miss Blaymires, of Picton, in 1890, and has three sons and three daughters. He is further referred to as a bookseller and stationer in Market Street North, Blenheim.