It's 1849.

William H. Bovee leaves his job at a coffee producer in New York City to seek his fortune in gold-fevered California.

But leaving behind the luxuries of the city, Bovee leaves behind a more expedient cup of Joe.

Out west, folks are still buying their coffee beans green, roasting the beans at home, then grinding them with a hand crank, all before actually brewing them.

Bovee builds California's first coffee mill, packaging and selling pre-roasted beans.

And in a moment of vision, he takes the process one step farther, making his mill the world's first to grind the already roasted beans on a large scale, then pack them conveniently into small, consumer-friendly tins.

Only a few years later, however, Bovee tires of the coffee business and sells his shares of the company to a young employee, James Folger.

Folger changes the name and grows the company to a nationwide brand, jumpstarting a race to find the quickest, easiest way to that morning caffeine fix.

For the 64% of Americans that drink coffee daily, an expedient cup is practically essential.