Michael Hare, 2nd Viscount Blakenham

Michael John Hare, 2nd Viscount Blakenham (25 January 1938 – 8 January 2018), was a British hereditary peer and environmentalist.

Blankenham was the son of Conservative politician and government minister John Hare, 1st Viscount Blakenham and Hon. Beryl Nancy Pearson, daughter of Harold Pearson, 2nd Viscount Cowdray.

After some time working for partly or wholly owned subsidiaries, he joined the senior management of Pearson plc (founded by his mother's ancestors) in 1977, and was managing director from 1978 to 1983, chief executive from 1978 to 1993, and chairman from 1983 to 1997. He also was Chief Executive (1983–93) and Chairman (1984–93) of the Financial Times, then a Pearson subsidiary.

A lifelong environmentalist, Blakenham was chairman of the Royal Botanical Gardens at Kew Gardens as well as Council Chairman of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds between 1982 and 1986 and president of Suffolk Wildlife Trust from between 1983 and 1987. He continued to develop the Blakenham Woodland Garden, which was created by his father. He also owned the island of Little Colonsay in the Inner Hebrides.

Blakenham lived in Suffolk and led the local political party Suffolk Together. He represented the party as a member of Mid Suffolk District Council from 2007 to 2015 under the name Michael Blakenham. During the 2014 European Parliament election he endorsed Rupert Read, lead candidate on the Green list in the East of England constituency.

Through his sister, Joanna Freda Hare, he was a brother-in-law of Stephen Breyer, who served as a Justice of the United States Supreme Court from 1994 to 2022.

Family

In January 1965 Blakenham married his 18-year-old first cousin, Marcia Persephone Hare (her father, his father's brother the Hon Alan Hare (1919–1995), married Melissa Mohr and has two children: Thomasina Inigo author Cressida Cowell (born 1966), married Simon John Cowell and has 3 children: Maisie Clementine Alexander artist Emily Faccini (born 1967), married Ben Faccini and has 3 children: Francesco Delfina Bay

He died in January 2018 at the age of 79.