The Very Beginning

Legend has it that in 2737 BC the Chinese Emperor Shen Nung was boiling drinking water over an open fire, a regimen he followed because he believed those who drank boiled water were healthier. A few leaves from a Camelia Sinensis plant overhead fell into the pot of water. The Emperor, known as the "Divine Healer", drank the mixture and from then on declared it gave one "vigour of body, contentment of mind, and determination of purpose."

Tea in Europe

Tea did not reach Europe, however, until nearly 1,000 years later, when Dutch traders brought tea from China & Japan. While the Dutch held a near monopoly on tea trading for some time, the British East India Trading Company wrestled control of much of the tea trade from the Dutch and began importing enough tea that Britain's public now had access to the delicious "new" drink.

The First Sale

Thomas Garway was among the first to trade tea in Britain, at his coffee house in Exchange Alley in the City of London, holding his first public sale in 1657. In 1660, Garway's broadsheet selling tea extolled its virtues, and described tea as "Wholesome, preserving perfect health until extreme old age, good for clearing the sight", and able to cure "Gripping of the guts, cold, dropsies, scurveys", and claiming that "it could make the body active and lusty".

In 1706, the young Thomas Twining opened a coffee house called "Tom's", just off London's Strand, close to where the aristocracy were building their homes after the Great Fire of 1664. However, he knew that the ladies of the aristocracy were the only people likely to buy his tea, but no self-respecting lady would enter a coffee house. So after 10 years trading as a coffee house specialising in good quality tea, he bought 3 small houses and turned them into a shop in 1717, thereby creating the first dry tea & coffee shop in Britain, and possibly the Western world. It was also a place where a lady could enter without impropriety.