Bell Pepper - Guatemala

The Maya used two calendars; the 260 day sacred round and the 365 day vague calendar. The first was for tracking social, cultural, celestial, and religious events. The second, a solar calendar, was used for plotting agricultural planting and harvesting schedules. The Maya calendar is the most complex of the ancient calendars.

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Capsicum annuum - Bell peppers are produced in a variety of colors including red, green, yellow, orange, white, brown, and purple. Peppers were first cultivated in Mexico and Central America. Despite the name, there is no relationship between bell peppers and the black or white pepper used for flavoring foods. Cristóbal Colón brought dried bell peppers back to Europe and the name “pepper” was attached to the plant because it had a spicy taste similar to the crushed seeds of Piper nigrum, common table pepper.

Potato - Peru

Solanum tuberosum - Potato plants are herbaceous perennials. They grow to about 60 centimeters in height and are usually pollinated by insects such as the bumble bee, but are capable of self-fertilization. Potatoes were domesticated in Southern Peru approximately 7,000 to 10,000 years ago and have since become the world’s 4th most important food crop following maize, wheat, and rice. There are over 4,000 varieties of the potato, each grown to suit different soils, climate or taste.

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The small municipality of La Rinconada, located in Peru’s San Antonio de Putina Province, is the world’s highest permanent settlement. The town is situated in the Peruvian Andes at an altitude of 5,100 meters. There are approximately 30,000 people living in La Rinconada, most being of Quechua ancestry. A nearby gold mine provides the only means of employment for the citizens of La Rinconada. Living at extreme altitudes can cause hypoxemia, a condition occurring when blood is oxygen starved.

Sweet Potato - North Carolina

In 1900, near Kill Devil Hill and Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, Wilbur and Orville Wright conducted several tests with gliders to better understand the principles of flight in preparation for a future attempt at powered flight. They returned in 1903, and were successful; Orville, on his first attempt, covered 36 meters.

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Ipomoea batatas - Sweet potatoes are native to South America and are now cultivated throughout the world as a leading food crop. They are distantly related to potatoes, but are not related to yams, although they are often mistakenly referred to as yams. Sweet potatoes have a sweet taste as opposed to the starchy texture and taste of yams. The leaves and shoots of the plant are also edible, but the tuberous roots are the primary part of the plant used as a food source for humans and fodder for domesticated animals.

Bittersweet - Denmark

Solanum dulcamara - Bittersweet is a member of the genus Solanum, the same genus as the potato. It is native to Europe and Asia, but can be found throughout the northern hemisphere. Being a vine, bittersweet can grow to lengths of 4 meters when attaching itself to trees for support. The fruit is a red berry about 1 centimeter in length and serves as an important food source for birds such as the European thrushes, but is poisonous when consumed by humans or livestock.

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The Kalmar Union was a unified Scandinavian state existing from 1397 to 1523. It included Denmark, Norway, Sweden, and Finland. Individual sovereignty of most local affairs was retained by each member, but domestic and foreign policy was directed by the reigning monarch. Its founding purpose was to check German intentions of expanding northwards. The Kalmar Union’s demise was caused by a lack of centralization. Denmark and Norway remained in their own union until 1814.