General Santa Anna, Chicle, and Chewing Gum
General Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna fought Davy Crocket, Jim Bowie and friends at the Alamo, but he did something good for Americans, too. He introduced them to chewing gum and over a century later, we’re still chewing away on it just like he did.
Santa Anna Introduces New York City to Chicle
The chewing gum story in America starts in 1836 after General Sam Houston took Santa Anna prisoner. While Santa Anna was a prisoner, he chewed chicle to quiet his nerves. Chicle is a dried sap that comes from a Sapodilla tree that grows wild in the jungles of Mexico, Central and South America and the Amazon Valley. Since Santa Anna came from Mexico, he had a supply of Sapodilla trees and chicle. General Houston spared Santa Anna’s life and Santa Anna decided to travel to New York City. He brought a supply of chicle with him.
One day Santa Anna chewed his chicle in front of a real Yankee inventor by the name of Thomas Adams. Thomas tried to use the chicle as a substitute for rubber, but it didn’t work. Then he discovered that Santa Anna had skipped back to Mexico and left him with all the bills for storing the chicle.
Thomas Adams Gets an Idea and Invents Chewing Gum
Thomas Adams and his son Horatio experimented with the chicle that was in the warehouse. They mixed it with hot water until it had the consistency of putty, then they rubbed, kneaded, and rolled it into a few hundred little balls which they presented to the druggist. The druggist sold the chews at a penny each. The chews were popular, even though the gum was tasteless. The druggist ordered more of his product and this encouraged Adams to invest another $55.00 in chicle development.
Adams got more shipments of chicle, rented a New Jersey factory loft and manufactured more of his little gum balls. He packed them in boxes and labeled them “Adam’s New York Gum‑Snapping and Stretching.” He started to look beyond New York City for markets.
Thomas Adams and His Son Expand Chewing Gum Territory
Another son, Thomas Jr., helped Thomas expanded his sales territory. Thomas Jr. was a traveling salesman and he carried the gum to the Mississippi River and points in between. By the time he returned from his sales trip, orders poured in. New York Gum stretched across the country. Next, Thomas Adams decided to put some taste into his gum. First he tried sassafras, then licorice. He called the licorice flavor Black Jack. Black Jack is the oldest flavored gum on the market.
Adam’s New York Gum had to overcome a lot of sales resistance. Parents wouldn’t let their children chew it. School teachers said it would wipe out Reading, Writing, and Arithmetic in the classroom. Some people spread the rumor that chewing gum was really made of horses’ hooves and glue. Parents, teachers, and other adults warned chewers that if they accidentally swallowed a piece, it would make their intestines stick together. But the chewers kept chewing.
Druggist Edward Beeman Enters the Chewing Gum Market
By 1880 many people were making chewing gum. One of them was druggist Edward E. Beeman. He combined a pepsin compound which he manufactured himself, with the chicle and blended the two into a peppermint flavored gum. He wrapped this into a paper with the picture of a pig on it. His idea was to show the customer that if he chewed Beeman’s gum he could eat like a pig!
Even with the pig on the wrapper, the gum sold so well that a banker from Cleveland, George Worthington, offered to help Beeman make more sales. Beeman accepted his offer and the first thing Worthington did was get rid of the pig and put Beeman’s bearded face on the wrapper. His picture stayed on his gum wrapper until the late 1950s.
William White Produces Peppermint Gum
It took William J. White, a popcorn salesman, made chewing gum more popular than popcorn. In the early twentieth century, White’s friendly grocer ordered a barrel of nuts and received a barrel of chicle by mistake. The grocer gave the barrel of chicle to White and he experimented with it. When neighbors asked about the strange smells coming from White’s house, he said, “It’s petrified bread, found in a baker’s oven in the ruins of Pompeii.”
White kept experimenting and finally produced a peppermint flavored gum that he called Yucatan after the Yucatan peninsula where much of the chicle came from. Yucatan ‑ the gum ‑ was so popular that it beat out all of the competition. Even today, much of the gum sold is peppermint flavored.
Frank Henry Fleer Makes Bubble Gum
Frank Henry Fleer did for bubble gum what Santa Anna did for chewing gun. Frank Fleer organized a bubble gum company and started making his gum around 1885. In the early 1900s Fleer made a kind of bubble gum he called Blibber Blubber, but it was sticky and didn’t stay together. It also made a bubble that would burst and stick to a child’s face so tightly that only vigorous scrubbing could get it off.
Fleer kept experimenting. In 1928 he introduced a strong bubble gum and snap back that he had made especially for children. He called it Dubble Bubble Gum. It had a dry bubble that blew up to balloon proportions. Soon children all over the country were blowing and popping it with pleasure. The Frank H. Fleer corporation produced a billion pieces of Dubble Bubble that cover the globe from Alaska to Zanzibar. It is the largest selling brand in the world and laid from end to end would make a belt around the equator.
No More Chicle
The gum industry spent fortunes in research. Companies created synthetic gum bases and plastic resins, similar to tree saps, that could be substituted for chicle. The synthetics were easier to control, uniform in quality and harmless if swallowed. After World War II, scarcely any manufacturers went back to chicle. The gum we chew today is mostly polyvinyl acetate, a synthetic plastic, and we chew it to the rhythm of 300 sticks per person at a total cost of more than $2 billion worth of gum sold in the United States every year.
And like Santa Ana, most of us chew gum for the same reason Santa Anna did‑ we like it!
References
Hendrickson, Robert. The Great American Chewing Gum Book. Chilton, 1976.
Redclift, Michael. Chewing Gum: An Unofficial History. Routledge, 2004.
Young, Robert. The Chewing Gum Book. Dillon Press, 1989
Santa Anna Introduces New York City to Chicle
The chewing gum story in America starts in 1836 after General Sam Houston took Santa Anna prisoner. While Santa Anna was a prisoner, he chewed chicle to quiet his nerves. Chicle is a dried sap that comes from a Sapodilla tree that grows wild in the jungles of Mexico, Central and South America and the Amazon Valley. Since Santa Anna came from Mexico, he had a supply of Sapodilla trees and chicle. General Houston spared Santa Anna’s life and Santa Anna decided to travel to New York City. He brought a supply of chicle with him.
One day Santa Anna chewed his chicle in front of a real Yankee inventor by the name of Thomas Adams. Thomas tried to use the chicle as a substitute for rubber, but it didn’t work. Then he discovered that Santa Anna had skipped back to Mexico and left him with all the bills for storing the chicle.
Thomas Adams Gets an Idea and Invents Chewing Gum
Thomas Adams and his son Horatio experimented with the chicle that was in the warehouse. They mixed it with hot water until it had the consistency of putty, then they rubbed, kneaded, and rolled it into a few hundred little balls which they presented to the druggist. The druggist sold the chews at a penny each. The chews were popular, even though the gum was tasteless. The druggist ordered more of his product and this encouraged Adams to invest another $55.00 in chicle development.
Adams got more shipments of chicle, rented a New Jersey factory loft and manufactured more of his little gum balls. He packed them in boxes and labeled them “Adam’s New York Gum‑Snapping and Stretching.” He started to look beyond New York City for markets.
Thomas Adams and His Son Expand Chewing Gum Territory
Another son, Thomas Jr., helped Thomas expanded his sales territory. Thomas Jr. was a traveling salesman and he carried the gum to the Mississippi River and points in between. By the time he returned from his sales trip, orders poured in. New York Gum stretched across the country. Next, Thomas Adams decided to put some taste into his gum. First he tried sassafras, then licorice. He called the licorice flavor Black Jack. Black Jack is the oldest flavored gum on the market.
Adam’s New York Gum had to overcome a lot of sales resistance. Parents wouldn’t let their children chew it. School teachers said it would wipe out Reading, Writing, and Arithmetic in the classroom. Some people spread the rumor that chewing gum was really made of horses’ hooves and glue. Parents, teachers, and other adults warned chewers that if they accidentally swallowed a piece, it would make their intestines stick together. But the chewers kept chewing.
Druggist Edward Beeman Enters the Chewing Gum Market
By 1880 many people were making chewing gum. One of them was druggist Edward E. Beeman. He combined a pepsin compound which he manufactured himself, with the chicle and blended the two into a peppermint flavored gum. He wrapped this into a paper with the picture of a pig on it. His idea was to show the customer that if he chewed Beeman’s gum he could eat like a pig!
Even with the pig on the wrapper, the gum sold so well that a banker from Cleveland, George Worthington, offered to help Beeman make more sales. Beeman accepted his offer and the first thing Worthington did was get rid of the pig and put Beeman’s bearded face on the wrapper. His picture stayed on his gum wrapper until the late 1950s.
William White Produces Peppermint Gum
It took William J. White, a popcorn salesman, made chewing gum more popular than popcorn. In the early twentieth century, White’s friendly grocer ordered a barrel of nuts and received a barrel of chicle by mistake. The grocer gave the barrel of chicle to White and he experimented with it. When neighbors asked about the strange smells coming from White’s house, he said, “It’s petrified bread, found in a baker’s oven in the ruins of Pompeii.”
White kept experimenting and finally produced a peppermint flavored gum that he called Yucatan after the Yucatan peninsula where much of the chicle came from. Yucatan ‑ the gum ‑ was so popular that it beat out all of the competition. Even today, much of the gum sold is peppermint flavored.
Frank Henry Fleer Makes Bubble Gum
Frank Henry Fleer did for bubble gum what Santa Anna did for chewing gun. Frank Fleer organized a bubble gum company and started making his gum around 1885. In the early 1900s Fleer made a kind of bubble gum he called Blibber Blubber, but it was sticky and didn’t stay together. It also made a bubble that would burst and stick to a child’s face so tightly that only vigorous scrubbing could get it off.
Fleer kept experimenting. In 1928 he introduced a strong bubble gum and snap back that he had made especially for children. He called it Dubble Bubble Gum. It had a dry bubble that blew up to balloon proportions. Soon children all over the country were blowing and popping it with pleasure. The Frank H. Fleer corporation produced a billion pieces of Dubble Bubble that cover the globe from Alaska to Zanzibar. It is the largest selling brand in the world and laid from end to end would make a belt around the equator.
No More Chicle
The gum industry spent fortunes in research. Companies created synthetic gum bases and plastic resins, similar to tree saps, that could be substituted for chicle. The synthetics were easier to control, uniform in quality and harmless if swallowed. After World War II, scarcely any manufacturers went back to chicle. The gum we chew today is mostly polyvinyl acetate, a synthetic plastic, and we chew it to the rhythm of 300 sticks per person at a total cost of more than $2 billion worth of gum sold in the United States every year.
And like Santa Ana, most of us chew gum for the same reason Santa Anna did‑ we like it!
References
Hendrickson, Robert. The Great American Chewing Gum Book. Chilton, 1976.
Redclift, Michael. Chewing Gum: An Unofficial History. Routledge, 2004.
Young, Robert. The Chewing Gum Book. Dillon Press, 1989