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The Popcorn Machine is not Modern

You might think that the popcorn machine is modern. Well, popcorn has been known to humans for roughly 1700 years. The earliest popcorn machine resource found is from south America and is a shallow round vessel with a small hole and a handle to hold it over a flame.
Historians believe that kernels of popcorn were popped by heating sand in a fire and stirring them in.
More recently popcorn machines became acclaimed in the mid 1800′s. They were larger affairs, often 7 or 8 feet across  and either steam or gas powered.
However these weren’t very efficient and the popcorn machine only really came of age towards the end of the 19th century when an American sign painter and owner of a shop, Charles Cretors, was inspired to make one, having bought a mercantile steam powered peanut roaster.  He was fascinated by how things worked and started to make something better. All the foundry patterns were made by Charles Cretors using a foot powered lathe. He then obtained a license to be a pedlar and placed the machine outside his shop.  People were used to train engines, but not to anything so much smaller and were very fascinated.
Within a short time he had built a popcorn machine that was able to roast 12 pounds of peanuts, or 20 pounds of coffee and in addition make popcorn.
The  popcorn machine was more productive. However, he also brought his sign making skills to the fore with beautiful, hand painted designs on the machine. These included shining nickel plate signs and copper and brass parts. He also included the novelty of the Toasty Roasty man, a small automated clown on the popcorn machine that advertised his products by rotating a tumbler full of peanuts on the top of the roasting drum.
In 1900 he made the original big horse drawn popcorn wagon. He made them to meet the needs of particular customers and also sold them through his expanding sales force.  Electricity was starting to take off at this time as well, and Charles Cretors used it to make the first electric powered popcorn machine.
Over the next few years movies started to become all the rage and popcorn was in demand from cinema goers.
In the 1950′s television became more popular at the expense of cinema.  The popcorn industry suffered as well  and also had a somewhat old fashioned image burden. Popcorn makers were remodelled and started looking more fashionable, somewhat like the juke boxes that were also in demand then, and regained market share.
Now they are very everyday in most theatres and cinemas. And in addition fairs and carnivals. The price of a industrial  popcorn machine varies, depending on how large it is.
And smaller, table top popcorn machines are now available for everyone to have at home. Although enjoyable when pre-popped, either at a venue, or if bought from a grocery, popcorn tastes much better if eaten quickly after being popped.
It is a healthy and tasty snack that has lots of fibre and can be sugar free and fat free with few calories, depending on what ingredients have been used when they’ve been popped.

About the Author

There is a growing amount of information on the Popcorn Machine at The Popcorn
Machine Site at http://www.popcornmachine.org.uk with product information for UK residents

pourn: Otter Creek Copper Ale

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