How Corn Changed Itself and Then Changed Everything Else

About 10,000 years ago, a weedy grass in Mexico transformed itself into corn-- and then transformed the Americas, even before First Contact. 

After First Contact, it spanned the globe and drove westward expansion in North America, building cities and inspiring innovators and entrepreneurs. 

Vampires, Henry Ford, time zones, Fritos, and the Chicago Bears are all part of this remarkable story.

Award-winning author, Road Scholar with the Illinois Humanities Council, speaker and food historian Cynthia Clampitt has pursued her love of culture, history, and food in thirty-seven countries on six continents, but has in recent years increasingly focused on the American Midwest. She has written textbooks for every major educational publisher in the U.S., including the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation and National Geographic Learning.