Hot tubs – a brief history

2000 B.C. Egypt

The Egyptians use baths for therapeutic purposes. The earlier forms of hot tubs are simply a caldera (a large, basinlike depression resulting fromthe explosion or collapse of the centre of a volcano).in which sizzling stones are placed to heat the water.

460 B.C. Greece

Hippocrates proposes a health regime which includes bathing, perspiration, walking and massages. The baths are often combined with gymnastics and education, the precursors or the modern gymnasium.

476 A.D. Europe

Cleanliness goes to the wayside. The church views the practice of bathing as a prelude to forbidden behaviour and sin.

737 A.D. Japan

The first ‘Onsen’ opens near Izumo. An Onsen is a public bathing house which uses water from a hot spring.

1571 Italy

The idea of baths as sources of disease starts to give way to the idea of bathing for medicinal purposes. The ‘culture of bathing’ starts to spread across Europe.

1800 Germany

Doctors are convinced that for each disease there is an appropriate medicinal spring which could be discovered through chemical analysis of the water.

1940 USA

The first home hot tubs begin to appear, mostly in California. They are made from oak barrels, wine tanks and oilve vats.

1950

The Jacuzzi brothers invent and begin to sell the J-300, a portable hydro-therapy pump and a spa  niche business is born.

1968

Roy Jacuzzi invents and markets the first self-contained, fully integrated whirlpool bath. By incorporating jets into the sides of the tub, it becomes the bath that single-handedly creates an industry.

1970 / 80sFibreglass shell hot tubs appear, then cast acrylic shells. For the first time, it is finally easy to achieve water cleanliness. Manufacturers install pumps. Filters, control systems and jets. The modern era of hot tubs begins. The market for traditional wooden hot tubs starts to diminish

 

 

2002

A new product enters the market called the Swim Spa which allows users to combine a Swim Spa for Swimming against the current of jets in 80 degree water and an area at the other end of the spa for relaxing.