Can you imagine a drink changing the course of history? No, we’re not talking about Coke or Pepsi here, but rather tea. This simple drink — which has been enjoyed by people around the world for thousands of years — has played a starring role in many major historical events.

Tea was discovered over 5,000 years ago in China. Legend has it that Chinese emperor Shen Nong was boiling water to purify it when some tea leaves fell into his pot. He liked the new “tea” drink so much that people throughout China soon began drinking it as well.

Tea was carried by Buddhist priests to Japan, where drinking tea at formal “tea ceremonies” became a high art form and a part of Zen Buddhism. The Japanese tea ceremony inspired a whole new kind of architecture, as tea houses were designed to look like simple forest cottages. And the hostesses of these tea ceremonies, the Geishi with their white painted faces and elaborate robes, also became important in Japanese culture.

By the 1600s, tea had spread to Europe. It was carried there by traders. In Europe, too, tea quickly became very popular. Tea became the national drink of England, and even had a meal named after it: the English Tea is a late-afternoon meal of sandwiches, pastries, and, of course, tea.

Tea also affected the politics and economies of countries in Europe. Portugal set up a trade route to deliver tea to European cities. And Great Britain created the East India Company to handle all its trade, including tea, with China and India. Because the East India Company was a monopoly, the price of tea was kept artificially high.

As you may know, the high price of tea played a very important part in the beginnings of the United States. During the Boston Tea Party, a group of colonists dumped a shipment of tea into Boston Harbor to protest the high price and high British taxes. After the American Revolution, though, U.S. citizens went right back to drinking tea. U.S. and British clipper ships raced each other around the globe to carry tea from China and India. During the 1700s and 1800s, some tea traders even got involved in drug dealing for tea: trading opium grown in India for the even more expensive tea. That practice led to England’s Opium Wars with China in the mid 1800s.

Through all these years, tea continued to be a popular drink around the world. At the beginning of the 20th century, two new ways to drink tea were invented. Iced tea was first served at the World’s Fair in St. Louis in 1904, and the tea bag was invented by an American, Thomas Sullivan, in 1908. Also in the early 1900s, “tea dances” were the popular place for young men and women in the United States to meet.

One drink, 5,000 years of history... and many major world events. Tea has had quite a history!

Please select any one of the historical events mentioned here and research it using the library and the Internet. Write a one- to two-page paper about what you learn. How did tea play a role in the event? What happened? Why?