Cornmeal mush! The name supaun seems to have died out. Having seedsman Thorburn mention it in his advertising got me curious as I never had heard of it and had no clue what he was talking about (he wrote like that, too, so you do not know what he is riffing on sometimes).
Once I looked it up in Google Books I find the word was in use in memoirs, songs and articles in the 18th century and to the mid 19th century. I think the 19th c. uses were by older people, so the name just didn't stick into the mid 1800s. Pone, hominy and samp I have heard of...although I am not sure I knew exactly what samp was. (Samp is a much more roughly chopped/cracked corn than any meal grind.)
Once I looked it up in Google Books I find the word was in use in memoirs, songs and articles in the 18th century and to the mid 19th century. I think the 19th c. uses were by older people, so the name just didn't stick into the mid 1800s. Pone, hominy and samp I have heard of...although I am not sure I knew exactly what samp was. (Samp is a much more roughly chopped/cracked corn than any meal grind.)
LEARNED FROM THE INDIANS
In a recent number of The Century, Mr. Edward Eggleston points out some of the many useful things which the white settlers learned from the Indians.
“The art of making maple-sugar and the culture of the maize were learned from the savages, who planted the corn in hills, grew beans around the stalks, and filled the intervening space with pumpkin-vines, as old-fashioned farmers do yet. The great factories of fish-manure along the Northern coast are tracked to the advice of an Indian given to the pilgrims to put a fish in every hill of corn. Hominy, Samp, supaun and pone are Indian words, and there is hardly an approved method of cooking maize that the Indians did not know:..."
1910 - Handbook of American Indians North of Mexico: N-Z, Volume 2; Volume 30, Part 2
In this book from 1851 an old lady who went visiting and expected nice dinners, was served potatoes and supaun by her cousin to test how she would react to such humble fare. She was at heart a nice old woman and reacted fairly well
More references:
Curiosities of Literature: And, The Literary Character Illustrated
https://books.google.com/books?id=O98-AAAAYAAJ
For many heroes bold and brave From New-bridge and Tappan, And those that drink Passaic's wave, And those that eat supaun; And sons of distant Delaware, And still remoter Shannon, And Major Lee with horses rare, And Proctor with his ...My Boy Life: Presented in a Succession of True Stories - Page 197
https://books.google.com/books?id=Zl43AAAAMAAJ
When we had partaken of our supaun and milk, I was cheered by my brother's coming in from outdoors with the news, that " the Bashan bull had gone to feeding." I must wind this story up with a not very pleasant finale. The calf had very good ...
