I t's a good story, but not good history. The only historic description of the event comes from Mourt's Relation , a 1622 source, in which there is no mention of popcorn. The event was not a Calvinist thanksgiving of the type celebrated by the Plymouth colonists, which was a religious observance at church, and would not have lasted several days, included non-Christian guests or secular recreations. It hasn't been found archaeologically, and there isn't any New England reference to the popcorn we know today in the 17th century.
Sweet corn is documented as only arriving in the region ca.
We have tried this with several antique and modern varieties. However, flint corn was most often prepared as hominy or samp by boiling, which is the most palatable way to use it, then and now. Historically it was the flour corn, with its soft, floury endosperm, which was favored for parched corn, the process most analogous to popping corn. While one can not be dogmatic on the fact, the assertion that popcorn was part of the quasi-mythic First Thanksgiving should be rejected.