The History Of Vaping Is Older Than You Think

Vaping is often seen as a very modern invention. However, the ideas, patents and concepts behind it are far older than most realise.

Given that they are seen as a modern, technological approach to help combat smoking, many people believe that vaping is a product of the 21st century.

Some people who are knowledgeable of the technology behind vaporisers, e-cigarettes and other vape supplies often will trace them back to the work of Hon Lik.

In 2003, Mr Hon created a design for a device that vaporised a pressurised jet of liquid with nicotine as a way to fight his own cravings after losing his father to Lung Cancer.

However, whilst this is the first modern e-cigarette, the first e-cigarette ever was made by Herbert A Gilbert in 1963, who created a way to replace tobacco with heated, moist flavoured air, which would produce flavoured steam and no tobacco.

He received a patent for his invention in 1965 but because smoking was still so accepted and fashionable that even The Flintstones advertised cigarettes, it was never commercialised.

Earlier even than this, in 1927 Joseph Robinson received a patent for an electronic vapouriser. It was not designed for tobacco, but instead to hold medical compounds that would be heated up and create vapours that could be therapeutic.

Depending on your interpretation of what qualifies as a vapouriser, the origins of vaping could be traced back to the invention of the shisha (or hookah), which can be traced back to at least 1560, but could be traced further back during the reign of Shah Tahmasp I of Persia (1524-1576).

Finally, the earliest known reference to vaping, or indeed to smoking in general goes back to the 5th Century BC and to the historian Herodotus.

He described the Scythians, who were based in what is now Central Asia and Eastern Europe, as people who would burn hemp seeds on red hot stones, creating a vapour.