Sept. 10, 1897: First driver arrested for intoxication

Tests to measure alcohol intoxication didn’t come along until the 1930s. But when George Smith became the first person arrested for drunken driving on Sept. 10, 1897, the police didn’t need a Breathalyzer. After all, the 25-year-old taxi driver had slammed his cab into a building in bustling London.

Smith later pleaded guilty and was fined 25 shillings, paving the way for future DUI arrests.

Laws banning driving a motor vehicle while intoxicated made their way to the U.S. when New York outlawed the practice in 1910. In 1936, Dr. Rolla Harger, a professor of biochemistry at Indiana University, developed a precursor to the Breathalyzer called the Drunkometer. Suspects blew into a balloon and their breath (plus any alcohol) was then mixed with a chemical compound. The more alcohol in the air, the darker the compound would turn. The modern Breathalyzer, a handheld version of the Drunkometer, was invented in 1953.

Still, public awareness campaigns about the dangers of drunk driving didn’t become widespread until the late 1970s and early 1980s.

In 2010, almost 1.4 million people were arrested for driving under the influence, following in Smith’s dubious tracks.