For centuries, blue powders and dyes were some of the most sought-after materials in the world. Ancient Afghan painters ground mass quantities of sapphire rocks to use for their paints, while snails were harvested in Eurasia for the tiny amounts of blue that their bodies would release.
And then there was indigo, which was so valuable that American white plantations owners grew rich by enslaving African people to grow and produce it. In 1905 Adolf von Baeyer created a chemical blue dye, that blue could be used for anything and everything.