Cold breakfast cereals can be traced back to mid-19th century America. Hot cereals such as grits, hominy, kasha, and various forms of porridge have been eaten for centuries in all parts of the globe. In the late 19th century, most Americans ate greasy meals for breakfast, due to a prevalence of cheap meat like beef and pork. This lead to a near fanatical obsession with an ailment called dyspepsia (we would call it heartburn today), especially among the middle and upper classes. Parallel to this there is a growing interest in cure-alls, nutritional science, processed food, and puritanical morals. Heavy, greasy meals were associated by American fundamentalist Christianity of the late 19th century with everything from slothfulness, to masturbation, and other failures of sexual morality. It is no coincidence that Battle Creek, Michigan was home to both the center of Seventh Day Adventism and the development of both Post and Kellogg brands of breakfast cereals. Though we now see sugary cereals like Lucky Charms as anything but a healthy breakfast, the near sugar free cereals of the mid 1890s were a heath food craze. Corn Flakes were first invented by John Harvey Kellogg at his Battle Creek based sanitarium to combat his patients dyspepsia, any general disease, and their sex drives. Kellogg wasn’t just anti-masturbation, he was anti-sex in general (he was also a proponent of eugenics and both male and female genital mutilation), including within the bonds of marriage. His bland, flaked cereal was meant to curb ant lustfulness, and any stomach complaints. Many of his patients were quite wealthy, and so his cereals became popular among the wealthy classes. Kellogg’s came first, in 1895, and dozens of rivals followed, many in Battle Creek. The second largest producer of boxed cereals, Charles W. Post (of Post Grape-Nuts, 1896) was in fact a patient of Dr. Kellogg. The cereals, which started out as health food cure all’s, became more popular when people such as John Kellogg’s brother William Kellogg decided to add some sugar to the recipe and market the food as the modern choice for breakfasts for all Americans, but especially to children and the growing middle classes. By 1910 or so, breakfast cereals were the staple of American breakfasts. Citations “Devoured” and “Pandora’s Lunchbox” (there’s also a really good episode of Sawbones on this topic)