Show corn boon to colonists the first europeans to recognize corns importance were the english colonists on our atlantic coast wheat they tried aried and it failed them and when the very existence of the massachusetts and jamestown settlements hung in precarious p re carious balance during those first firs t hard winters it was corn that saved them capt john smith forced every family of his little band to plant corn they were rewarded handsomely like the sparse crops of the first dawn of civilization it became a means of exchange a form of money surplus corn built up trade and commerce encouraged the growing stream of immigrants crossing the atlantic and opened the gates to wealth and prosperity |