Vending Machines: An American Social History

Although the 1880s are considered the beginning of the vending machine era, these devices have existed for a couple of thousand years. The earliest reference to a vending machine was made by Hero--a Greek mathematician, physicist and engineer who probably lived in Alexandria during the first century a.d.--who described and illustrated a coin-operated device to be used for vending sacrificial water in Egyptian temples. Completely automatic, the device was set in operation by the insertion o...