Broomcorn Sorghum vulgare var. technicum is a type of sorghum that is used for making brooms and whiskbrooms. It differs from other sorghums in that it produces heads with fibrous seed branches that may be as much as 36 in. long. Although the origin of broomcorn is obscure, sorghum apparently originated in central Africa. Production of this crop then spread to the Mediterranean, where people used longbranched sorghum panicles for making brooms in the Dark Ages. Broomcorn may have evolved as a result of repeated selection of seed from heads that had the longest panicle branches. The broomcorn plant was first described in Italy in the late 1500s. Benjamin Franklin is credited with introducing broomcorn to the United States in the early 1700s. Initially, broomcorn was grown only as a garden crop for use in the home. By 1834 commercial broomcorn production had spread to several states in the Northeast and started moving west. Illinois was the leading producer of broomcorn in the 1860s, but production of the crop in that state virtually ceased in 1967. Some production has occurred in Wisconsin since 1948. Domestic broomcorn acreage is low because of the limited demand for the crop and its vast labor requirements, particularly for harvesting. In the early 1970s, approximately 100,000 acres of broomcorn were harvested in the United States annually, with the highest acreages in Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico and Colorado. It is also produced in Illinois and Iowa. Half of the domestic needs for broomcorn are imported from Mexico.

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