Soybeans originated in Southeast Asia and were first domesticated by Chinese farmers around 1100 BC. By the first century AD, the crop had spread to Japan and other countries across Asia. It wasn’t until 1765 that soybean seeds arrived in the Americas, when a colonist in Georgia planted seed from China. Though soy sauce was already known in Europe and the colonies, the plant itself remained rare. In 1851, seeds were distributed to farmers in Illinois and the Corn Belt—reportedly from a rescued Japanese fisherman—marking the first steps toward American soybean farming.

By the 1870s, soybeans gained popularity as livestock forage, thriving in the hot, humid conditions of states like North Carolina. Around the turn of the century, the U.S. Department of Agriculture began encouraging farmers to grow soybeans as animal feed. In 1904, George Washington Carver discovered their value not only as a source of protein and oil but also as a soil-enriching crop, leading to his famous crop rotation system that revitalized cotton farming in the South. In 1919, William Morse co-founded the American Soybean Association and later collected over 10,000 varieties of soybeans from China to expand research and improve yields.