White cedar (_Thuja occidentalis_) cured scurvy in Jacques Cartier's crew during 1535 after St. Lawrence Iroquois taught them to brew vitamin-C-rich tea from its needles. European herbalists rapidly propagated the tree across the continent while losing all knowledge of its medicinal origin and Indigenous source.

Agave sustained Mesoamerican ritual and society before becoming Mexico's national symbol through tequila production. The plant's heart had to die to produce pulque, mirroring Aztec cosmology where sacrifice sustained both humans and gods.