The True And Often Bizarre History Of Cereal | Food: Now and Then | NowThis

Kellogg’s created cereal as a way to get people to stop masturbating.
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Cereal wasn’t always the breakfast candy we know and love today.

Breakfast cereal actually started out as a health food. In the 1860s, people were eating like crap and all that pork, whiskey and coffee really had people feeling funky. Then a man named Dr. James Caleb Jackson started a “water spa” to get people back in shape. This space included diets, exercise, and a breakfast cereal he made from bran flour mixed with water, resulting in rock-hard wheat bricks — the first granola. The stuff was so hard you had to soak it in milk overnight to prevent you from breaking your teeth.

The bricks didn’t stick but they inspired other people like John Harvey Kellog to create his own version of granola in 1881, which was actually made with the intent to get people to stop masturbating. He thought a bland diet would translate into more purity.

The first sugary cereal came about in 1939 in the form of Ranger Joe Popped Wheat Honnies. From there, super-sweet cereal sort of became the norm in America. Cereal started making cameos in kid’s cartoons and the 50’s brought about breakfast favorites like Trix, Frosted Flakes and Cocoa Puffs. Unfortunately today, cereal consumption is actually on the decline, but we’ll always be able to remember its former glory.

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