Steigel Glass Ware
Henry William Stiegel (May 13, 1729 in Cologne, Germany – January 10, 1785 in Pennsylvania, USA) was a German-American glassmaker and ironmaster.
Stiegel was the eldest of six children born to John Frederick and Dorothea Elizabeth Stiegel in the Free Imperial City of Cologne.[1] He immigrated to British North America in 1750 with his mother and younger brother, Anthony (his father and other siblings had died). The Stiegels sailed on a ship known as the Nancy, and arrived in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on August 31, 1750.[1]
After arriving, Stiegel took a job in Philadelphia with Charles and Alexander Stedman, most likely as a clerk or bookkeeper. In 1752, Stiegel moved to what is now Lancaster County, Pennsylvania to work with Jacob Huber, an ironworker. He married Huber's daughter, eighteen-year-old Elizabeth, the same year. The couple had two daughters, Barbara (born 1756) and Elizabeth (born 1758). Elizabeth Huber Stiegel died on February 13, 1758, only ten days after giving birth to their second daughter. Stiegel married his second wife, Elizabeth Holtz, within a year. They had a son named Jacob.[1]
When Jacob Huber died in 1758, Stiegel and several business partners from Philadelphia assumed ownership of Huber's foundry and renamed it Elizabeth Furnace (in honor of his wife). Stiegel later purchased a forge in Berks County called the Tulpehocken Eisenhammer. He called the place Charming Forge, another iron forge near Lancaster.[2]
Once a successful ironmaster, Stiegel turned his attention to another industry – glass making. At the time, the majority of glassware was imported to the colonies and priced so high that it was considered a luxury item. After a trial period of glass blowing at Elizabeth Furnace, Stiegel founded the American Flint Glass Manufactory near Manheim, Pennsylvania in 1765. Initially, the firm made utilitarian bottles and window glass.
Later the factory produced blown glass tableware including wine glasses, cream pitchers, salt dishes and sugar bowls all in vibrant colors of blue, green and purple. Stiegel hired skilled workers for his glass making operation. The Hershey Story collection contains a handwritten one-year contract between Henry William Stiegel and Lazarus Isaac dated 1773. Isaac is described as a glass “cutter and flowerer” from Philadelphia and was paid five pounds, ten shillings each month.
In addition to the colored glass, many wares produced at the American Flint Glass Manufactory had cut or etched decorations while others were hand painted with traditional Pennsylvania German motifs in red, blue and yellow.
An active lay Lutheran and associate of Henry Melchior Muhlenberg, he donated the land on which the Lutheran church in Manheim, Pennsylvania is now built. Stiegel was also a founding member of the German Society of Pennsylvania, formed in 1764 to aid newly arrived German immigrants.[3] He led the fundraising efforts to secure the plot of land on which the Society's first building was eventually erected.[4] Stiegel reportedly died in poverty.[5]
