The Gum Story

About 5 years ago, there was a scientific study that claims that chewing gum improves one's memory by about 35%. The researchers were not sure why, but their finding is that a test group that chewed gum recalled more and performed better on exams than another group that did not. One theory is that chewing gum releases insulin which stimulates the part of the brain related to memory.

Could this mean that people in Singapore are more forgetful? This Asian country outlawed the sale of chewing gum in 1992 as a way to reduce littering, and violators are actually jailed. In 2004, the ban was lifted (due to US government pressure), but now only allows the sale of gum for medicinal purposes from drugstores. Today, you cannot buy gum in Singapore unless you give your name and identification.

This is quite the opposite in the U.S. where the people love chewing gum. Recent statistics show that an average american will chew about 300 pieces of gum in a year. There is even a place in San Luis Obispo, California called "Bubble Gum Alley". Here, two facing walls have been decorated with thousands of wads of used chewing gum deposited by passersby over several decades. Now an attraction, the site have about 300 visitors a day.

In University of Arizona dental museum, there is a chewing gum on display. This gum was the one chewed by gangster John Dillinger (a known gum chewer) when he was captured. And in 2002, Curt Mueller paid a whopping $10,000 for a gum that was chewed and spit out by baseball all-star Luis Gonzales. So, next time you are in MLB or NBA game, collect those gums spit out by star players, put them in a glass, and auction it in eBay. Who knows, maybe this is your opportunity to get rich and not rely too much on Google AdSense or affiliate marketing.

It is still debatable as to how chewing gum was invented. Some people claimed that it was invented by the Mayans over 300 years ago. They boiled the sap of the sapodilla tree and chewed it. The earliest known (named) chewing gum sold in the U.S. is "State of Maine Pure Spruce Gum". It was created by John Curtis, who, in 1848 brewed up a batch of the gum by using pulp from a spruce tree. The sales was not too successful, apparently because the gum tasted like, well, spruce tree. It was in 1872 that the first flavored gum came out. Named "Black Jack", it is also the fist gum to be sold in sticks.

Today, Wrigley is the biggest manufacturer of chewing gums. It was, however, not the original product sold by the company. In 1891, William Wrigley, started selling scouring soap and as a marketing scheme, he offered baking soda to customers. When Wrigley found out the consumers cared more about the baking soda, he started selling it as his principal product and giving chewing gum as bonus. Again, the gum proved to be more popular so Wrigley switch to gum for his business and never looked back.

Wrigley was, actually, a marketing genius. In 1915, he mailed out gum to every person listed in US phone directory (about 1.5 million homes), and did it again in 1919 to 7 million households. Today, Wrigley continues the tradition of innovation, with producing numerous flavors on one single product and devising ingenious marketing schemes. The company had actually created a gum to treat erectile dysfunction, but they have to wait until Viagra patent expires in 2011 before they can sell the product. I'm guessing we can see an increase to the number of men chewing gum even more.

Random Odds & Ends

• Americans eat the equivalent of 100 acres of pizza each day, or about 350 slices per second.
• Ancient Greeks believed that drinking beer would cause leprosy.
• Hawaii is the only state in the U.S. that grows coffee.
• Denmark ranks as the largest per capita consumer of candies. An average Dane would consume 35.1 pounds of candy per year.
• Honey is believed to be the only food that does not spoil. Honey found in the tombs of Egyptian pharaohs has been tasted by archaeologists and found to still be edible.