Root beer is a sweet North American beverage traditionally made using the root bark of the sassafras tree Sassafras albidum or the vine of Smilax ornata (sarsaparilla) as the primary flavor. (+)

It has been sold in since the 1840s, and written recipes for root beer have been documented since the 1860s. Pharmacist Charles Elmer Hires was the first to successfully market a commercial brand of root beer. Hires developed his root tea made from sassafras in 1875. (+)

Then, debuted a commercial version of root beer at the Philadelphia Centennial Exposition in 1876, and began selling his extract. (+)

Hires was a teetotaler who wanted to call the beverage "root tea". However, his desire to market the product to Pennsylvania coal miners caused him to call his product "root beer", instead. (+)

In 1886, Hires began to bottle a beverage made from his famous extract. By 1893, root beer was distributed widely across the United States. Non-alcoholic versions of root beer became commercially successful, especially during Prohibition.