“I never drink coffee at lunch. I find it keeps me awake for the afternoon."
Ronald Reagan, U.S. President 1981-1989
Melitta Bentz (1873-1950) invented the coffee filter to solve a simple household need, and it resulted in a hugely successful company and her filter being used throughout the world.
Bentz wanted to find a way to produce coffee without the grounds in it and began to experiment with passing the coffee through various types of filters, eventually trying the blotting paper that her children used when doing homework. By putting a circle of the blotting paper into a metal cup with holes in it, Bentz could pass hot water over the coffee, then let it drain into another cup, with the grounds left behind in the filter. In 1908, Bentz filed a patent for her invention and, with her husband, formed the Melitta Bentz Company to promote it. The invention took off at the Leipzig Trade Fair the following year, with over 1,000 coffee-makers sold. The company later began to produce its own filters, rather than using blotting paper. Like those used today, these had a great "wet strength" and would not fall apart when wet.
The Melitta Bentz Company later developed filter bags, as used in modern filtered coffee. Although many rival methods of coffee-making have been developed since 1908, Bentz's filtering system still holds its own, and continues to be widely used in homes as well as in commercial catering.
