Question: Summerville, South Carolina, claims to be the birthplace of which southern beverage?
Answer: Summerville, South Carolina, claims to be the birthplace of sweet tea. The town earned a federal trademark for the title in 2013, citing its long history of tea cultivation dating back to the late 1700s. By the early 1900s, large gatherings in Summerville were serving iced tea mixed with sugar—one of the earliest documented instances of sweet tea on a wide scale—helping cement its place as a Southern staple.
