The infamous El Pulpo was a U.S. corporation trafficking in, of all things,bananas.It was officially known as United Fruit Company—or Chiquita Brands International today.First cultivated in Southeast Asia thousands of years ago,bananas reached the Americas in the early 1500s,where enslaved Africans cultivated them in plots alongside sugar plantations.There were many different bananas,most of which looked nothing like the bananas in supermarket aisles today.In the 1800s, captains from New Orleans and New England ventured to the Caribbean in search of coconuts and other goods.