Celebrity photographers recently captured shot after shot of actor Ryan Phillippe sporting a cup of tea while out-and-about. Iced tea, that is.

The quiet star and one-time husband of actress Reese Witherspoon isn’t new to the beverage. According to a number of entertainment news sites, early in his career, Elizabeth Taylor and Elton John once took him out for tea. The stars made quite an impression. Afterwards Phillippe recalled, “I was sitting there looking at them interact, and I’m thinking, these people have raised millions of dollars to save people. The potential power of celebrity is astounding.”

Phillippe currently stars in Stop-Loss now playing in theaters.

Have you ever wanted to see the big picture when it comes to tea history? We’ve located an online tea history that can help.

The Tea Page features a timeline which extends from 2000 BC, when tea was grown in India, to 1953 AD when the play Tea and Sympathy (starring Deborah Kerr) was performed at New York’s Ethel Barrymore Theater. 

Points of interest along the timeline also include the year 222 when tea was “mentioned as a substitute for wine for the first time in Chinese writings.” And, how in 805, tea was “introduced to Japan as a medicine.” Not to forget our British friends, there’s even a spot in the history for 1597 when the first English mention of tea appears.

For more detailed accounts in tea’s history, view these Bigelow posts: The Japanese Tea Ceremony, How Tea Got to England (Parts I and II), How Russia was Introduced to Tea (Parts II and III), and the History of Iced Tea in America.