Heroin Facts. Heroin is processed from morphine, a naturally occurring opiate extracted from the seedpod of certain varieties of poppy plants. The opium poppy has been cultivated for more than five thousand years for a variety of medicinal uses. Heroin was first synthesized from morphine in 1874.From 1898 through to 1910, Bayer, the German pharmaceutical company, marketed it under the trademark name Heroin as a cough suppressant and as a non-addictive morphine substitute (until it was discovered that it rapidly metabolizes into morphine). This heroin may be sticky like roofing tar or hard like coal, with its color varying from dark brown to black. 2  Street heroin is rarely pure and may range from a white to dark brown powder of varying consistency.