The New International Encyclopædia/Sower, Christopher

SOWER, sour (or SAUR), (1693-1758). An early American printer and publisher, born at Laasphe, near Marburg, Germany. After receiving a university education, and studying medicine at Halle, he emigrated to Pennsylvania in 1724, and in 1731 settled at Germantown. There in 1738 he set up a printing press and began the publication of an almanac in German, which was continued by his descendants for sixty years. In 1739 he issued the first number of Der Hoch-Deutsch Pensylvanische Geschichte-Schreiber, a quarterly magazine, the first of the sort published in Pennsylvania. In 1743 he published a quarto edition of Luther's translation of the Bible in German, which was, with the exception of Eliot's Indian Bible, the first to be published in America. He continued his activity in publishing both English and German works, and in connection with that business established a type foundry, the first in America, a paper mill, and an ink factory. He is also generally credited with being the inventor of cast-iron stoves.