As for the running on corn oil, I think you may be thinking of the original diesel engine which was actually run on coal oil and can now run on vegetable oil. I have 2 Mercedes Benz diesels that have been modified to run on used vegetable oil. Works like a charm. And of course there's also bio-diesel which is simply refined vegetable oil, another great alternative to both gasoline as well as petroleum diesel.

John E

Backed by Baron von Krupp and Machinenfabrik Augsburg Nurnberg Company in Germany, he began experimenting with a high-pressure ammonia engine. In 1892 Rudolf Diesel was issued a patent for a proposed engine that air would be compressed so much that the temperature would far exceed the ignition temperature of the fuel. In other words, no spark would be needed to ignite te mixture.

His backers provided him with engineers to help him develop an engine that would burn coal dust -- at the time, there were mountains of useless coal dust piled up in the Ruhr valley.

Experimental engines

The first experimental engine was built in 1893 and used high pressure air to blast the coal dust into the combustion chamber. While the prototype blew its cylinder head off but, four years later, Diesel produced a reasonably reliable engine. His ideas for an engine where the combustion would be carried out within the cylinder were published in 1893, one year after he applied for his first patent.

Further developments using coal dust as fuel failed. A compression ignition engine that used oil as fuel was successful and a number of manufacturers were licensed to build similar engines.