The first of five clues. Each one below gives a little more away.
I began as the sap of a Central American tree.
An exiled Mexican general brought me north hoping somebody could turn me into rubber.
I am the second most common litter on Earth, after cigarette ends.
Singapore banned me for years.
You chew me, and you do not swallow.
Chewing Gum
Santa Anna, living in exile in New York, handed chicle to Thomas Adams to develop as a rubber substitute. It failed at absolutely everything except being chewed.
Chicle is latex tapped from the sapodilla tree, chewed in Mesoamerica long before Europeans arrived. It reached the United States through Antonio López de Santa Anna, the exiled Mexican general, who brought a supply to New York hoping Thomas Adams could turn it into a rubber substitute for carriage tyres. Every attempt failed. Adams, out of ideas, boiled some into pellets and sold it as gum, and it worked immediately. Modern gum base is synthetic rubber, which is why it no longer biodegrades and why it is now the second most common street litter after cigarette ends.
Reading five clues at once is not the game. In the real thing they arrive one at a time and every wrong guess costs an hour. Play mystery #54 · today's mystery · the vault
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