U.S. & World History – One nationally recognized picture has an interesting background. Entrepreneur Samuel Wilson (1760-1854) founded a meat-packing business in Troy, New York, in 1790. By the time of the War of 1812, Wilson had become a prominent citizen and won a contract to supply meat to the U.S. Army. A new meat that he was selling became so popular with the troops, that the Army nicknamed him after his product. It has since lost its’ immense popularity and the name was slightly changed. But for almost 50 years beginning in the early 1800’s, Wilson was simply known as “Uncle Spam”.