Easton Oliver/Unsplash
- Food items and technological innovations that you thought were invented in the US might actually have roots overseas.
- Some inventions, such as the television and light bulb, were perfected in the US, but first developed elsewhere.
- Other things, like hot dogs and blue jeans, were popularized in the US by European immigrants.
The US is known as the land of opportunity, but some innovations that you thought were quintessentially American were first developed elsewhere, and often introduced to American consumers by immigrants.
From apple pie to the first automobile, here are 16 things that may not be as American as you thought.
Contrary to the idiom, apple pie isn’t American.
jeffreyw/Flickr
Despite the phrase that labels it the zenith of American culture (“as American as apple pie”), the flaky, fruity dessert didn’t originate in the US.
Recipes for pie can be found as early as the Ancient Greeks, according to the American Pie Council. However, medieval England popularized the dish, then known as “pyes” with crusts called “coffyns,” and usually filled with meat.
Both Dutch and British settlers are credited with bringing the humble apple pie to the Americas.
America’s national anthem is sung to the tune of a British drinking song.
Charlie Riedel/AP
When Francis Scott Key penned the words to the poem that ultimately became “The Star-Spangled Banner,” he had the melody of a rather ignoble song in mind. “To Anacreon in Heaven” is a British drinking song that praises debauchery rather than patriotism — yet Americans proudly listen to and sing the notoriously tricky-to-nail tune on the Fourth of July and at countless sporting events throughout the year.
The Wright brothers didn’t invent the plane.
AP Images
Apparently, A New Zealand farmer named Richard Pearse took flight for roughly 350 yards in March of 1902 — months before the Wright brothers nailed down a more sustained flight.
See the rest of the story at Business Insider
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