James Pinder was apparently born in Sheffield on 18 April 1836, the son of James Pinder (1810-1840) and his wife, Elizabeth (c.1803-1885).  His father, who may have first worked as a saw maker, became a grocer and tobacconist in Church Street.  However, he died on 7 April 1840 (aged 30) and was buried in Ecclesall.  His widow then operated a beerhouse, while her son James found a job as a commercial clerk in a Britannia metal manufactory.   James Pinder’s entry in the 1868 directory stated that he was a manager at Mappin & Webb.   According to The Ironmonger (12 November 1887), Pinder’s business was founded in 1860, though significantly not until 1874 was a silver mark recorded at Sheffield Assay Office for John [sic?] Pinder & Co, Carver Street  (the register noting, curiously, that this firm became James Pinder & Co).  Certainly, James Pinder was operating the company from Carver Street by the late 1870s, manufacturing electro-plate tea and coffee sets, cruets, spoons, forks, fish carvers, desserts, candelabra, and centrepieces.  In 1881, the firm employed ten workers.  

By 1891, James had remarried and was operating Springfield Hotel, Broomspring Lane, with his wife (besides running the electro-plate business).  By 1901, he had retired and the firm had moved to Arundel Lane under James’s son, Edward Clark Pinder.  In that year, the firm became ‘Ltd’ with £10,000 capital and with Henry T. Wanklyn (1874-1943) and Henry J. Jackson (1836-1903) as directors.  In 1903, the company was liquidated.  James Pinder, Junction Road, died on 13 November 1908, leaving £3,822.  Edward C. Pinder became a coal and ganister hewer.  The trade mark was a centrepiece (picture), enclosing the letter ‘P’.  (The mark was later used by the Sheffield office of Wilkinson Sword in Arundel Lane.) Pinder also used a picture of a shield emblazoned with the words ‘PARAGON METAL’, which was a material that the company used for spoons and forks.