• Sugarbeets are descended from wild sea beets
• The early Romans and Greeks cooked the leaves and used them as herbs for headaches and "turnings of the brain," inflammations of the eyes and were found to be good against all venomous creatures but would not use the roots.
• By the Middle Ages, the roots were chopped and felt to have great remedial powers believed to be as good as a laxative.
• Sugar, as we know it, was first used by man as early as 510 BC by the Emperor Darius. He called it the "reed which gives honey without bees."
• Western Europe discovered sugar cane as a result of the Crusades in the 11th century AD - it was a "new spice."
• Beets were first identified in 1741, but were not successfully harvested for sugar until much later.
• The first sugar factory in the US was built in Massachusetts in the late 1830s.
• The first successful beet sugar venture began in 1879 in California.
• Up until the 1500s, sugar was so expensive it was used in small amounts as medicine and to sweeten wine, but not in food.
• It was presented as gifts to royalty in jeweled boxes.
• In the 1500s, a teaspoon of sugar cost the equivalent of $5.
• In 1900, sugar cost four cents a pound.
• During WWII, you could only buy 4 oz. of sugar a week. To discourage people from buying more sugar, the government began the myth that sugar caused hyperactivity.
• Our great-great-grandmothers used sugar to starch their petticoats.
• Sugar is the only taste humans are born craving.
• In Britain and other parts of Europe, sugar was commonly sold in solid cones and required a "sugar nip" - a pliers-like tool to break off pieces.
• When you look at a grain of sugar under the microscope it is a translucent crystal, reflecting light from its 14 facets just like a jewel

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