John Nixon (10 May 1815 – 3 June 1899) was an English mining engineer and colliery proprietor and an influential figure in the development of the South Wales coalfield and export business.
Leaving school at the age of fourteen, Nixon was set to farmwork for a time, and shortly after was apprenticed to Joseph Gray of Garesfield, the Marquis of Bute's chief mining engineer.
Some years later he accepted the appointment of mining engineer to an English company working a coal and iron field at Languin near Nantes.
Lucy Thomas of the Graig colliery at Merthyr, who supplied the Thames steamers, was disinclined to extend her operations, and Nixon was compelled to return to the north of England.
After being on the point of failure from lack of capital he obtained assistance and achieved success, with the Navigation Colliery in Mountain Ash being completed in 1860, becoming the first true deep pit in South Wales.
Nixon succeeded, after a long struggle, in inducing the railway companies of Great Britain to adopt Welsh coal for consumption in their locomotives.