Fast Facts
- Each ear of corn has an even number of rows—most often 16 rows, but always an even number!
- Native American tribes honored corn as a sacred gift. Many held corn festivals and dances to celebrate good harvests and thank the Earth for its abundance.
- Only one type of corn can make popcorn—it has a special shell that traps steam inside until it bursts open with a pop!.
- Corn comes in many colors—not just yellow! Some varieties are red, blue, purple, white, and even multicolored, often called “Indian corn.”
Corn has a wild ancestor called teosinte, a grassy plant first grown by Indigenous peoples in southeastern Mexico about 8,000–10,000 years ago. Teosinte looked very different from modern corn—it was a spiky grass with tiny cobs—but scientists say it only differs by about five genes. Early farmers carefully saved and replanted seeds from plants with the best traits, slowly turning teosinte into the corn we know today.
As Indigenous peoples traveled north and south from Mexico, they carried corn seeds with them, spreading it across the Americas. Corn, also known as maize, became one of the most important foods for Native American tribes. It was often grown together with beans and squash in a traditional planting method called The Three Sisters. Many tribes celebrated the early corn harvest with a special ceremony called the Green Corn Dance.
When Europeans arrived in the Americas, Indigenous peoples shared their knowledge and corn seeds with them, and corn was likely enjoyed at the first Thanksgiving in 1621.
Sources and additional information:
https://www.nal.usda.gov/collections/stories/three-sisters
https://nebraskacorn.gov/cornstalk/research/history-of-corn-from-ancient-grain-to-modern-maize/