20170615

The Tea Bag

Americans actually “invented” the tea bag.

Although the Chinese had been using tea bags for centuries, it was a chance of fate that an American merchant sent samples of tea in silk packets—which were then dunked into boiling water by mistake.

In any case, the invention changed the lives of millions of Englishmen, allowing tea to be truly portable and thus drunk on building sites, in mines, and while fighting Argentinians over small pieces of rock.

Up until the popularization of the tea bag, tea was a strictly breakfast or evening drink.

The revolution of tea bag technology emancipated the working class from being drunk all the time, and a national stereotype of tea drinking was further enhanced.