How much do you know about Soybeans?

How much do you know about SoyBeans?

Information gathered for you by Biggs Cadillac Buick GMC

SoyBeans aren’t just for eating.

Bayer and Ashland have developed soy-resin body panels that currently are being used on John Deere tractors. These panels are dramatically lighter and more durable than the steel units they replace, and they're also more flexible and easier to paint, so we suspect it's only a matter of time before similar pieces find their way onto passenger cars and trucks.

• Biodiesel — Fuel for diesel engines can be produced from soybean oil by a simple process called transesterification. This process removes the glycerin from the oil, leaving soy biodiesel.  Soy biodiesel is cleaner burning than petroleum-based diesel oil.  Its use reduces particulate emissions, 

• Soy oil produces an environmentally friendly solvent that safely and rapidly removes oil from creeks, streams anand it is non-toxic, renewable and environmentally friendly.

• Bio-composites are building materials made from recycled newspaper and soybeans. They replace other products traditionally made from wood, such as furniture, flooring, and countertops.

• Particleboard, laminated plywood and finger-jointed lumber are made with soy-based wood adhesives.

• Soy products are also found in many popular brands of home and commercial carpet, and in auto upholstery applications.d shorelines without harming people, animals and the environment.

• Soy is an ingredient in many industrial lubricants, solvents, cleaners and paints.

• Soy-based lubricants are as good as petroleum-based lubricants, but can withstand higher heat. More importantly, they are non-toxic, renewable and environmentally friendly.

• Soy-based hydraulic fluid and rail flange lubricants are among the more recent products developed with check-off funds.

• Candles made with soybean oil burn longer but with less smoke and soot.

• SoyInk is superior to petroleum-based inks because soy ink is not toxic, renewable and environmentally friendly, and it cleans up easily.

• Soy crayons made by the Dixon Ticonderoga Company replace the petroleum used in regular crayons with soy oil making them non-toxic and safer for children.

Soybeans in our seats.

Soy based foams are currently being

developed for use in coolers, refrigerators, automotive interiors and even footwear.  Beginning in 2007, vehicles rolled off the production line with soy foam in the seats.  New uses in the automotive and equipment industry followed, including lubricants, body parts, interiors and seating.

North Carolina Historical Highway Marker A-70

      “With the boll weevil taking its toll on North Carolina’s cotton industry, the Elizabeth City Oil and Fertilizer Company, incorporated to manufacture cottonseed oil and other cotton by-products, tried its hand at a new commodity on December 13, 1915. At that time, under the management of William Thomas Culpepper, the company crushed approximately 20,000 bushels of soybeans, generating the first commercially produced domestic soybean oil in the country. The manufacture of the soybean oil was completed without a single alteration in existing equipment. Both the oil and the residual “cake,” usually ground into meal, were highly marketable. Other oil mills, in towns such as Winterville, New Bern, Farmville, and Wilson, began working with soybean oil shortly thereafter. The advent of domestic soybean processing made the easily grown plant popular throughout North Carolina. 

      The soybean was first planted in America in the late 1800s as forage for livestock. In 1904, George Washington Carver discovered that the soybean was a good source of protein and oil. He also learned, in experimenting with crop rotation, that planting soybeans for two years actually helped improve the soil conditions for later cotton crops. Following such research, soybean production increased. The plants flourish in North Carolina’s hot, humid summers, and as of 2002, the state ranks fifteenth in the nation in soybean yields. At the time of the first processing in Elizabeth City, North Carolina was the leading producer of the legume.” 

The oil processing plant was located on property at the corner of Ehringhaus and McMorrine Streets in Elizabeth City. It is no longer standing. 

North Carolina was the first state in America to grow soybeans commercially on a large scale, and the first to crush domestically grown soybeans. North Carolina was America's leading state in soybean seed production and acreage from the

early 1900s until 1924. This early pioneering work proved to both soybean growers and crushers in other states that this new crop had great potential, and thus was a key factor in the growth of the soybean industry in America. 

The Early Years, to 1899. It is not known exactly when the soybean was introduced to North Carolina, but it was probably between 1870 and 1881. Tom Byrd, a journalist, reported in 1965 that C.B. Williams, the state's great soybean pioneer, once said that "The first soybeans coming to North Carolina had been brought to Hyde County about 1870 by an old sea captain who obtained them in the Orient. They later spread to other coastal locations." Hartwig (1981) mentioned this same event, without citation. Yet Williams made no mention of this key incident in his many extensive writings on soybeans in North Carolina.

Frank W. Hollowell Jr. of Elizabeth City reported in 1982 that in about 1880 his grandfather, Christopher Wilson Hollowell, planted soybeans on his "Bay Side" plantation in Pasquotank County, in the northeast corner of North Carolina. These soybeans were obtained from China by a friend. Mr. Hollowell died in 1892. 

• http://ncsoy.org/media-resources/uses-of-soybeans/

• http://www.edmunds.com/car-technology/renewable-and-recycled-materials-help-make-cars-green. 

• http://www.soyinfocenter.com/HSS/north_carolina.phphtml

• http://www.ncmarkers.com/Markers.aspx?MarkerId=A-70

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