Caspar Wistar (glassmaker)
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Caspar Wistar (1696–1752) was a German-born glassmaker and landowner in Pennsylvania. He was the grandfather of Caspar Wistar, the physician and anatomist after whom the genus Wisteria is named.
He was born in the Rhenish Palatinate in Bavaria, the son of a forester. He emigrated to Pennsylvania in 1717 and worked at various manual trades, including soapmaking and the manufacture of brass buttons.
He became a British subject in 1724 and joined the Religious Society of Friends (the Quakers) in 1726, and married Catherine Jansen in 1727; they had seven children. With the support of Quaker merchants and political leaders, he set up a glass factory and began buying land and selling it to new immigrants from Germany.
His land deals made him one of the richest men in Pennsylvania.
