In 986, a Viking named Bjarni Herjólfsson became the first European to spot North America. He was lost, trying to sail from Iceland to Greenland.… Read More
For centuries, the Mayans chewed chicle, dried sap of the sapodilla tree. Then in 1845, inventor Charles Adams thought to add flavoring to the chicle, and shortly after that opened the first chewing gum factory. Doctors warned that chewing gum would "exhaust the salivary glands and cause the intestines to stick together."
source: Don Wulffson, The Kid Who Invented the Popsicle