Chew on this: First chewing gums were from tree resins and beeswax

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Fourth-graders in Rachel Boehm's classroom at Hawthorn Elementary North in Vernon Hills asked, “What is the history of gum?”

Chewing gum — and spitting it out — has been a pastime for thousands of years.

Wads of gum have been made from tree sap, beeswax, paraffin and petroleum. A 5,000-year-old wad of birch tree resin — with teeth marks — was uncovered at an archeological dig in Finland. The sticky lump was found alongside pottery, arrowheads and jewelry made of petrified tree resin.

Ancient Greeks liked chewing mastic, the sap drawn from the short, scrubby, Mastic evergreen. The word mastic, derived from the ancient Greek and Phoenician languages, means “to gnash teeth.”

Living at about the same time, but nearly half a world away, the Mayans enjoyed chicle, dried sap collected from the sapodilla tree.

Early Americans enjoyed chewing lumps of spruce tree resin and beeswax.

Commercialism in the 1800s inspired the budding chewing gum industry to make more lasting records, and flavor.

In the 1840s, State of Maine Pure Spruce Gum was marketed using chunks of spruce tree sap as gum. Chicle gum was marketed in the 1860s by Adams, naming it Adams New York No. 1 Gum. The first vending machine gum flavor was tutti fruitti. Bubble gum was developed and sold in the 1920s.

Despite being the top country to manufacture chewing gum, the U.S. falls to seventh place when it comes to actually chewing the stuff. The citizens of the tiny country of Andorra are the world's No. 1 gum chewers.

Chewing gum sold today is made from synthetic rubbery concoctions and are often petroleum based. Chewing gum comes in hundreds of flavors, shapes and package styles. Sometimes gum is the best medicine — various remedies have been included in the recipe.

The chewing gum business is profitable, with nearly 10 percent of all confection sales in the U.S. involving gum sales, and sales are good. The industry brings in about $3 billion each year, with sales climbing slowly but steadily.

Check these out

Cook Memorial Library in Libertyville suggests these titles on chewing gum:

• “Chewing Gum: A Sticky Treat,” by Elaine Landau

• “William Wrigley, Jr.: Wrigley's Chewing Gum Founder,” by Joanne Mattern

• “Patents: Ingenious Inventions: How They Work and How They Came to Be,” by Ben Ikenson

• “The Kid Who Invented the Popsicle and other Surprising Stories about Inventions,” by Don L. Wulffson