In the early 1880s, two brothers, Henry and Frank Fleer invented chewing gum.
(Of course it really started way, way back in time. Archeologists claim that prehistoric men and women chewed on lumps of tree resin for pure enjoyment. How primitive you say, but before WWII chewing gum was made from chicle, the sap of the sapodilla tree, a form of rubber that softens and hardens according to temperature. Henry and Frank Fleer began experimenting with this stuff and Henry Fleer just covered this tasteless rubber with a sugary white coating and named it "Chiclets. Nowadays the main ingredients in gum are sugar, gum base, corn syrup, softeners, flavouring and colouring. You see, we haven't come that far.)