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“This time-honored treat can be sweet or savory, caramelized, buttered or plain. However it is enjoyed,” urges the National Day Calendar, “make sure to enjoy it on National Popcorn Day, January 19th.”
“Oh Popcorn!” salutes Days of the Year.com. “Delicious and delightful, it is part of so many traditions: Popcorn balls at Halloween, Popcorn strings at Christmas, and Popcorn all year round at the movies!”
“Nearly seven millennia before movie nights and microwaves, humans munched on popcorn,” History.com confirms. “Maize cobs and husks from archeological sites in Peru hint that the snack’s popularity dates back as far as 4,700 B.C.! Naturally, since they didn’t even have ceramic pots at their disposal back then, chances are they roasted the cobs directly over coals and open flames.”
“Corn was first put to domestic use in Mexico 9,000 years ago,” reports Wikipedia.
“Many historians even believe that popcorn is the first corn that humans ever knew.”
“Popcorn started becoming popular in the United States in the middle 1800s,” says one scholar. The term ‘popped corn’ first appeared in 1848 in Bartlett’s Dictionary of Americanisms. Then “in 1896, Louis Rueckheim added peanuts and molasses to popcorn to bring Cracker Jack to the world. The national anthem of baseball was born in 1908 when Jack Norwith and Albert Von Tilzer wrote the song Take Me Out to theBallgame”—giving the product free publicity with the line, “Buy me some peanuts and Cracker Jack!”
Soon, baseball cards became ‘the prize inside every box’ (below left) … and a hit with chicks even today!
As they wrote, “I don’t care if I never get back” if babes got back like at lower left … why nowadays, the “Toy Surprise Inside” slogan has become so ‘electric’ it’s been used to sell a line of vibrators!
While Take Me Out to the Ballgame has become the third most sung song in America—behind only Happy Birthday and The Star-SpangledBanner.
Yet in the 1920s “movie theaters wanted nothing to do with popcorn,” explains Andrew F. Smith, author of the definitive book on the snack, Popped Culture: A Social History of Popcorn in America (below left). “Because they were trying to duplicate what was done in real theaters. They had beautiful carpets and rugs and didn’t want popcorn being ground into it.” Plus, they wanted to avoid the distracting noise of snacking and ‘crunching’ during a film. Though loads of butter (below left) can often quiet things down …
When talkies were introduced in 1927, however, the film industry was opened up to a much wider clientele—since literacy was no longer a requirement to read subtitles. “By 1930,” Smithsonian magazine reflects, “attendance at movie theaters had reached 90 million per week! Such a huge patronage created larger possibilities for profits—especially since the sound pictures now muffled munching—but movie theater owners were still hesitant to bring snacks inside of their theaters.
Enter the Great Depression {let’s not!}, which presented an excellent opportunity for both movies and popcorn,” Smithsonian continues. “Looking for a cheap diversion, audiences flocked to the movies. And at 5 to 10 cents a bag, popcorn was a luxury that most people were able to afford. If those inside the theaters couldn’t see the financial lure of popcorn, enterprising street vendors didn’t miss a beat: they bought their own popping machines and sold popcorn outside the theaters to moviegoers before they entered.”
As author Andrew Smith explains, “Early movie theaters literally had signs hung outside their coatrooms, requesting that patrons check their popcorn with their coats.”
Check out this modern moviegoer who isn’t about to take that lying down …
“At that time,” notes Forkful.com, “these theaters were built with elaborate architectural elements and referred to as movie palaces. Owners were against popcorn because they believed it would ruin the first-rate atmosphere they strived to create.” Such as at Chicago’s ornate Patio Theater, which was built in 1927 and still in operation today (below left). “The snack’s messy nature also threatened to ruin a theater’s furnishings.”
“Eventually,” says Smithsonian, “movie theater owners came to understand that concessions were their ticket to higher profits, and installed popcorn stands in their theaters” (above right).
“Thus,” observes Wikipedia, “while other businesses failed during the Great Depression, the popcorn business thrived and became a source of income for many struggling farmers.” And while many movie theaters also went under, ‘those that began serving popcorn and other snacks survived.”
Then came World War II, when “sugar rationing diminished candy production, and Americans compensated by eating three times as much popcorn as they had before!” The marketing move from vendors to vixens didn’t hurt either …
So with those two hellacious events spanning the 1930s, the marriage of movies and popcorn became made in heaven.
Amazingly, Smith summarizes: “Unlike other culinary fads, popcorn has never lost favor with the American public.” Perhaps because it’s also become associated with sex … as evidenced by this pair of popcorn pinups painted by legendary illustrator Gil Elvgren—whose artwork graced the nosecone of many military aircraft during WWII.
The models might well have been brunette Barbara Hale {of future Perry Mason secretary fame} and flame-haired Arlene Dahl {future mother of Lorenzo Lamas}.
His other regular posers included Kim Novak and even Donna Reed, the epitome of the “perfect housewife and mother” in the late ’50s and early ’60s. Speaking of wholesome, none other than Ozzie and Harriet promoted popcorn in ads around that time (below left) … a far cry from the “hot buttered” blonde promising to ‘blow ourmind’ of today!
But what truly made the product ‘pop’ was when one of those Midwest family farmers saved from foreclosure due to popcorn’s popularity during the Depression—Orville Redenbacher of Brazil, Indiana—launched his namesake brand of microwave popcorn in 1970. Once anyone could ‘do it’ at home—with the slogan “…just pop it in your mouth”—the kernel was clearly out of the bag …
A sly sexual suggestion that current Canadian cutie Andi of AndiLand.com embodies online {note the red Redenbacher brand bag in her oral Orville homage}.
Asked which gender gets to sample her tongue talents, the 34B-25-30 web celeb smiles: “I don’t like to use labels, but I enjoy both boys and girls.” {Chest as it should be!}
Though fellow Canadian snacker Bryci specializes: Celebrating her ‘7 Year Itch’ on that anniversary of launching Bryci.com, the 28FF-24-34 brunette vixen vowed in 2016, “We’re going to do our best to spice shit up, push some boundaries, experiment a little more, and fuck as many girls as we can along the way!”
So forget about trying to count gal•ories.
It appears popcorn is everywhere these days—adorning both bras {like this incredible edible one from 2015} …
… and puffy panties, currently on the market.
And in case no panties are handy …
Indeed, their buckets runneth over …
… as the link between the morsels and movies is featured in full force!
Clearly, the salty snack once disparaged by theater owners as “street food” has now evolved from films to fashion—or movies to models—even becoming an accessory on the runway of no less than Victoria’s Secret (below left)!
Puffy pieces also adorn the posterior of these popular leggings featured in today’s catalogs (above right)—forming a fitting END to this first of two posts celebrating National Popcorn Day.
Celebrity-stuffed Part Two is already in the oven …
