British-born investment banker Anthony Hodges had a hand in bringing the Penguins to Pittsburgh, but his greatest interest was with dogs.

The Monroeville resident, who judged dog shows internationally for 50 years, died Saturday at age 87. He died from congestive heart failure and complications of adult onset diabetes.

Born in Manchester, England, he first made a name for himself as a long distance bicycle champion in the mid-1930s.

"He once spent three months of the family's salary buying a road bike," said his son, Thomas Hodges, of Oakmont.

Mr. Hodges met his first wife, Mary, when she joined his bicycle club just as war was breaking out across Europe. He enlisted in the Royal Navy in 1940, and they were married in 1941 while he served on a World War I vintage destroyer.

That ship was sunk by a mine, but Mr. Hodges was rescued and went on to officer's training in South Africa. He spent much of the war escorting convoys in the English Channel but was in the West Indies when the war ended.

In 1946, he and Mary immigrated to Canada, where their two daughters were born. He worked in the insurance industry in Montreal until 1963, when concerns about the Quebec separatist movement led him to take a job with Mellon Bank in Pittsburgh.

Three years later, one of his major projects involved bringing the Penguins to Pittsburgh as an NHL expansion team. He retired in 1980 as chairman of the bank's trust department.

But many interests outside the office defined his life. He was a gifted musician and violinist who directed the choir at St. Bernard Catholic Church in Mount Lebanon for a time in the 1970s. He was an avid fly fisherman, who often could be spotted at the Rolling Rock Club in Ligonier.

But show dogs were his defining passion.

When the family lived in Canada, a friend had given him a Great Dane puppy. Champion Aquehonga Allspice went on to become the top-winning Great Dane in Canada in 1957. Mr. Hodges became hooked.

He bred Danes but had his greatest success as a judge, passing the stringent tests required to judge many different breeds and traveling the world to do so.

"Banking was his life as far as his career goes, but his heart was in the dogs," Thomas Hodges said. He judged shows in places as far flung as New Zealand, South America and Europe.

"It was a great opportunity to meet new people. There are a lot of great people in dogs."

One of the highlights came in 1993, when he was selected to judge Best in Show for the prestigious Philadelphia Dog Show. His judging career continued until 1997, when he suffered a heart attack while in the ring for a show in West Virginia, and had to be flown to Pittsburgh for quadruple bypass surgery.

In addition to his son, he is survived by his wife, Olive; two daughters, Beverley Anne Graham, of San Francisco, and Andrea J. Hodges, of Markham, Ontario, Canada; a brother, Frank, of Montreal; four grand-children; and three great-grandchildren.

Visitation will be from 7 to 9 p.m. today and 2 to 4 and 7 to 9 p.m. tomorrow, at the Gene H. Corl Funeral Home and Cremation Center of Monroeville. A Mass will be celebrated at 10 a.m. Friday in North American Martyrs Church, Monroeville.