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Here are 15 facts about cranberries:

1. Another name for cranberries is “bounceberries” because they bounce when ripe.

2. Some Native Americans called the cranberry ibimi which means “bitter berry.” Other tribes called it sassamanash.

3. Native Americans and Pilgrims used cranberries as a red dye.

4. Wild cranberries were probably part of the first Thanksgiving in 1621.

5. Today, cranberry sauce is an essential part of American and Canadian Thanksgiving celebrations.

6. The first recorded use of the word “cranberries” appeared in 1647 in a letter written by missionary John Eliot.

7. New England sailors ate cranberries, a good source of vitamin C, to fight off scurvy.

8. The first commercial canned cranberry sauce was put on the market by the Cape Cod Cranberry Company in 1912.

9. 690 million pounds of cranberries will be produced in the United States in 2007.

10. Wisconsin in the nation’s #1 cranberry producer and is expected to produce 390 pounds this year. Massachusetts, New Jersey, Oregon, and Washington also produce millions of pounds of cranberries every year.

11. Only 5% of cranberries are sold fresh. The remaining 95% are turned into cranberry juice, cranberry sauce, and other cranberry products.

12. Cranberry juice was first made in the 1600s. Today it is a popular folk remedy used to prevent and treat urinary tract infections.

13. The Great Cranberry Scare of 1959 occurred after it was revealed that cranberries from Oregon and Washington had been contaminated with a carcinogenic weed killer called aminotriazole. Cranberries were pulled from shelves just before Thanksgiving, causing a disaster in the cranberry industry that lasted for several years.

14. One cup of fresh cranberries contains about 50 calories.

15. One cup of cranberry sauce contains about 400 calories.

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