In 1767, Joseph Priestly produced the first man made, palatable carbonated water. He produced a carbonated water beverage by pouring water back and forth between two small vessel held in a layer of carbon dioxide over the fermenting mass in a brewery vat. Priestly suggested that carbonated water might be useful in curing or preventing sea scurvy.
The Schweppes Company, the earliest bottler of carbonated water regards Joseph Priestly as ‘the father of our industry’.
It was not until 1781 that carbonated water began to be produced on a large scale, with the establishment of companies specialized in producing artificial mineral water.
Jacob Schweppes’s association with Priestly in developing ‘aerated’ waters for commercial sale began in Geneva in 1783.
The first of these factories was built in Manchester, England, by Thomas Henry. The name ‘soda water’ was introduced after chemist Richard Bewley suggested adding a little soda (sodium carbonate).
Joseph Priestly (1733 – 1804) invented soda water