June brings Ramadan, Father’s Day, Flag Day and even National Doughnut Day are observed, and summer makes its arrival. But for the entire 30 days it’s National Iced Tea Month, celebrating the most beloved southern drink.

A popular story is that an enterprising English merchant at the 1904 St. Louis World’s Fair, due to the unexpected hot weather, decided to add ice to his tea servings. This is not the real story of the birth of iced tea, but it did boost the beverage’s popularity.

Actually, English and American variants of iced tea had been in existence since the early 1800s. The first were cocktails of tea and alcohol known as “tea punches,” and green tea was preferred over black. Black tea today is the preferred tea probably taking the lead around 1884. A recipe published by the Boston Cooking School gave a recipe for iced tea using black tea. “House Keeping in Old Virginia” introduced the making of sweet iced tea in 1879 but it called for green tea.

Tea has a history stretching back 5,000 years. Iced tea has a history that parallels with the development of refrigeration, the ice house, the ice box (refrigerator) and the commercial manufacture of pure ice, which were all in place by the mid-19th century. The term refrigerator was used for the first patented ice box in 1803. These ice boxes were common up through the end of the 19th century and beyond in the United States.

By the early 20th century, iced tea had gained in popularity and many cookbooks gave directions for making the drink. Black tea completely replaced green tea as the preferred type for serving cold because it was much less expensive. By World War I Americans were buying special tall iced tea glasses, long spoons and lemon forks. By the 1930s, ladies were commonly referring to the tall goblet in crystal sets as an “iced tea” glass.

Today iced tea comes in many variations, even in bottles. There are two traditional iced teas in the U.S. The only difference between them is sugar. It is served sweetened primarily in the southern states and served plain in most others. Southerners swear by their sweetened iced teas and drink it by the gallon, not just as a summertime drink but year round with most meals, as well.

Next to water, tea is the most consumed beverage in the world. In 2014, Americans consumed over 80 billion servings of tea, or more than 3.6 billion gallons. About 85 percent of the tea consumed in this country is iced.

NOTE: Information of iced tea was taken from “Tracing the Origin of Iced Tea,” “The Sweet History of Iced Tea,” “American as Iced Tea” and “History of Iced Tea.”