During the early history of modern America, colonists learnt from local Red Indians how to chew the gum—like resin formed on spruce trees when the bark was cut. Lumps of spruce gum were sold in the Eastern U.S. in the early 1800’s, making it the first crude commercial chewing gum sold.
Modern day gum products appeared in U.S. around the middle of the 19th century. An exiled Mexican general, Santa Anna who chewed chicle, introduced it to an inventor called Thomas Adams, who began to try and use it as a substitute for rubber. Adams tried to make toys, masks, and even rain boots out of chicle, but all his experiments failed. In despair, one day, he popped a piece of chicle into his mouth as he had seen Santa Anna do, and as he chewed resignedly, he suddenly had a brainwave. Why couldn’t he add flavour to the chicle and sell the product as a kind of candy? He did so, and soon the world’s first chewing gum factory was born!
By the early 20th century, Americans could not get enough of the confection called chewing gum invented by Thomas Adams.
