The Great Preservation Technologies

Canning was invented by Nicolas Appert, a French confectioner and chef, who spent roughly fifteen years experimenting with sealing food in glass jars and heating them in boiling water before publishing his method in 1810 in "L'Art de conserver les substances animales et végétales." Appert developed his technique in response to a prize of 12,000 francs offered by the French government under Napoleon, who wanted a reliable way to feed troops on campaign. Remarkably, Appert succeeded decades before Louis Pasteur established that microorganisms caused spoilage: he knew empirically that heat plus an airtight seal preserved food, without understanding why. Shortly after, the Englishman Peter Durand patented the use of tin-coated iron canisters, giving rise to the modern tin can.