History. Corn was domesticated about 10,000 years ago in what is now Mexico. Archaeologists discovered that people have known about popcorn for thousands of years. Fossil evidence from Peru suggests that corn was popped as early as 4700 BC.

When was popcorn first popped?

Evidence of popcorn's first “pop” did not appear until the 1820s, when it was sold throughout the eastern United States under the names Pearl or Nonpareil. Its popularity quickly began to spread throughout the South and by the 1840s popcorn had started to gain a foothold in America.

How was popcorn first found?

But the oldest popcorn ever found comes from a cave in New Mexico, estimated to be 5,600 years old. ... We don't know exactly who discovered that popcorn can pop, but it's a process that would have happened when people first started mixing dried kernels and heat. Popcorn pops through interaction with heat.