I used to live in a house built in 1959 that had galvanized pipe, and I sold one last year that was built in 1962 and had copper pipe. Both are in Livonia, Michigan.
I think that time frame is about right. They used both for a while. But around that time was when we were buying large amounts of pipe from Japan. A lot of that pipe was made from recycled metal and it wasn't until later they found it was of poor quality and was rusting and corroding faster than pipe made here. So many homes were being re-plumbed with copper. Then they also decided the lead content was too high in galvanized pipe so copper became the standard.
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It started about 5000 years ago. No, that is not a typo. From the copper development association,--> The craftsmen who built the great pyramid for the Egyptian Pharaoh Cheops fashioned copper pipe to convey water to the royal bath. That was indeed, over 5000 years ago. It was at the end of the 1920s that copper was first introduced in the U.S. as supply pipeing, and before that cast iron had replaced the very first systems which were wood. Yup, wood. From WIKI comes this little tidbit ---> In old construction, lead plumbing was common. It was generally eclipsed toward the end of the 1800s by galvanized iron water pipes which were attached with threaded pipe fittings. Higher durability, and cost, systems were made with brass pipe and fittings. Copper with soldered fittings became popular around 1950, though it had been used as early as 1900. Plastic supply pipes have become increasingly common since about 1970, with a variety of materials and fittings employed, however plastic water pipes do not keep water as clean as copper and brass piping does. Copper pipe plumbing is bacteriostatic. This means that bacteria can't grow in the copper pipes. Plumbing codes define which materials may be used, and all materials must be proven by ASTM, UL, and/or NFPA testing. So it isn't exactly clear when each type was first introduced as many different types overlaped each other, but in general, and concidering *modern* as being after 1900, galvanized was probably more frequently used than copper, even though copper goes back much further. Al
