Jonas Alströmer

Jonas Alströmer (7 January 1685 – 2 June 1761) was a pioneer of agriculture and industry in Sweden.

Born Jonas Toresson (later changed to Alström) in the town of Alingsås in Västergötland, in 1707 he became a clerk for Stockholm merchant Alberg in London.

He then established a sugar refinery in Gothenburg, encouraged improvements in potato cultivation, tanning, cutlery, and shipbuilding.

Although Alströmer was pivotal in popularizing the cultivation of potatoes, the popular idea that he was responsible for introducing the potato in Sweden is a myth, as potatoes were grown in the Uppsala Botanical Garden (in what is now the Linnaean Garden) by Olaus Rudbeck in 1658, before Alströmer was even born.

The King made him a knight of the Order of the Polar Star in 1748, and soon after with letters of nobility, changing his name to Alströmer.