ABSTRACT
The early history of breakfast cereals is part of the folklore of the modern food industry and well enough known to require here only a brief restatement (Collins 1976; International Directory o f Company Histories 1990: II; Marquette 1967; Powell 1956). They originated out of an interest in health foods that can be traced back to the 1830s, and specifically to the experiments carried out from the 1860s by John Harvey Kellogg, the pioneer nutritionist, at the sanitorium at Battle Creek, Michigan. His search for ‘Food in a condensed form excel lently suited to the wants of the human system’, designed for use by vegetarian religious sects such as the Seventh Day Adventists and gastric sufferers generally, produced first Granula, a mixture of wheat and oats, then Granola, a mixture of wheat, oats and maizemeal. The 1890s saw in quick succession the development of all the main types of ready-cooked breakfast cereal. In 1892 Shredded Wheat was formulated by Henry D. Perky, a Denver lawyer. Two years later Kellogg created the first flaked cereal, Granose, and in 1898, the corn flake. Around the turn of the century, oat flakes were pioneered by the Beck Cereal Co. of Detroit, and Grape Nuts, a dextrinized cereal similar to Granola, by the inimitable Charles Post. Soon after, the Quaker Co. launched Puffed Wheat and Puffed Rice, based on the Anderson patent of 1902, and the Battle Creek Pure Food Co., malted wheat flakes. By the time of the First World War, the basic manufacturing
processes - dextrinizing, flaking, shredding and puffing - had been perfected, and formulations - maize, wheat and oat flakes, puffed and shredded wheat, and dextrinized grain mixtures - were being produced on a factory scale. Out of the myriad of individual products and manufacturers - up to 1912 an estimated 107 different brands of corn flakes had been produced in the United States - there had emerged the hierarchy that was to dominate the industry, at home and
abroad, for the remainder of the century. Kellogg, Quaker, Shredded Wheat (later part of Nabisco), the Postum Cereal Co. (later the Post Division of General Foods), the Force Food Co. of Buffalo, and Armour Grain Co. of Chicago (later part of the Ralston Purina Co.), were the already established market leaders. In Britain, there had existed a small niche market for cereal health
foods since the 1830s when a Grahamite school, based on the American prototype, was established in Surrey, dedicated to simple living and a diet based on vegetables and Graham bread (Griggs 1988: 54-61). In 1880, Zwieback, a German cereal food consisting of slices of bread thoroughly baked a second time till crisp throughout, was popular among dieticians as a readily digestible alternative to ordinary bread at breakfast and other meals (Olsen and Olsen 1912: 284). At least sixty-four different proprietary brands of cereal-based foods and drinks suitable for infants, invalids and food reformists were in production in 1912 (Tibbies 1912: 438-50). Most of the leading brands of US breakfast cereal were obtainable in Britain before the First World War. Tibbies (1912) mentions Grape Nuts, Malta-vita, Shredded Wheat, Vigor, Granose, Vitos, Quaker Rolled Oats, plus formulations by Pettjohns, Ralston and Eustace Miles. At this stage there is no direct evidence for the importation of Kellogg products, but Kellogg himself was a powerful influence among health reformers such as the Olsens, managers of the Surrey Hills Hydropathic and Leicester Sanitarium, who prescribed Toasted Wheat Flakes and Granose for invalids and ‘persons of weak digestion’ (Olsen and Olsen 1912: 169-70). The most successful product by far, prior to the First World War,
was the hot cereal, Quaker Oats. The Quaker Co. began shipping to Britain in 1877, selling initially through a local distributor; it estab lished its own importing agency in 1893 and, in 1899, a wholly owned marketing subsidiary, Quaker Oats Ltd, with branches in London, Liverpool, Newcastle and Glasgow (Bound 1966: 1; Marquette 1967: 213ff). By 1914, oatmeal porridge had become almost a mass con sumption food, whereas ready-to-eat cereals had only a very limited distribution, being sold mainly through high-class grocers such as Fortnum and Mason in London, and specialist health food shops. Force Wheat Flakes were first imported in 1902, Post Toasties in 1907 (originally under the name of Elijah’s Manna) and Shredded Wheat in 1908. Advertising in society magazines, such as Strand and Black and White, they ranked as food curiosities but, as Quaker had already demonstrated, with skilful merchandising there existed a clear poten tial for dramatic growth.
