by Justina Veritas

I was in my favorite coffeehouse the other day, snacking on the most deliciously crunchy granola while waiting for my pistachio latte. As I unabashedly scarfed down this “healthy” breakfast (suspected ingredients: oats, raisins, pepitas, assorted unknown tiny seeds, and what tastes like an obscene amount of butter and brown sugar), I began to question the healthiness of my choices. I learned the hard way that if you consume the whole cup, your jaw will be aching the better part of the day (I suppose I could eat only half, but my folks didn’t raise a quitter); but how healthy could something this scrumptious and crunchy really be?

That got me thinking, “Who on earth even came up with granola?”

I recalled watching a documentary on foods that shaped our nation, including the history of the Kellogg company. I thought lawyers and granola had been involved. As granola doesn’t usually evoke the thought of “lawyers” in the general consciousness, I took that to mean my memory must have been correct; lawyers played some part in our nation’s breakfast cereal trajectory.

I love cereal! Well done, lawyers!

According to Wikipedia, granola has its roots in the Nineteenth Century health food movement in the United States. The very first version of granola was created by Dr. James Caleb Jackson in 1863 at the Jackson Sanitarium in New York. This healthy treat, made from double-baked graham flour dough, was called “granula.” This “delicious” sounding treat was so hard, it had to be soaked overnight before eating. (My current granola purveyor is clearly going for this “old school” crunch.)

Shortly afterward, Dr. John Kellogg created a similar product (also unfortunately called “granula”) at the Battle Creek Sanitarium in Michigan. However, Jackson threatened legal action against Kellogg for copying his product name, so Dr. Kellogg changed the name to “granola.” For years, Dr. Kellogg’s younger brother, Will W.K. Kellogg, assisted his brother in research to improve the vegetarian diet of the sanitarium's patients, especially in the search for wheat-based granola. As granola was hard and not especially popular (go figure, folks didn’t want a trip to the Victorian-era dentist due to their breakfast selection), later experiments led the Kellogg brothers to accidentally develop the flaked cereal process. This eventually produced corn flakes in the 1890s, which was patented by Dr. John Kellogg in 1895 and was a commercial breakthrough.

There is considerable disagreement over who was involved in the discovery of corn flakes, but it is believed that it was Will Kellogg who persuaded his brother to serve the food in a flake form (what were the other options tried . . . sheet form? log form? Kellogg’s corn-logs . . . yeah, they made a good call with “flakes”), and soon the flaked wheat was being packaged to meet hundreds of guest mail-order requests after they left the Sanitarium. Will could see the commercial potential of this product and the mail-order business. However, Dr. John forbade his brother from distributing cereal beyond his sanitarium customers. As a result, the brothers fell out, and Will launched his own company in 1906, the Battle Creek Toasted Corn Flake Company.

The brother’s legal dispute centered around who had the right to use the family name “Kellogg” on cereal packaging. Although Will had convinced his brother to relinquish rights to the product, in 1906, John sued Will’s company over the use of the “Kellogg” name. Nonetheless, Will's company continued to produce and market the hugely successful Kellogg's Toasted Corn Flakes and was renamed the Kellogg Toasted Corn Flake Company in 1909. (From what I read, Will’s company was producing 120,000 cases of corn flakes a day at this time.)

The legal skirmishes continued through 1920 (wait . . . over ten years? Yep, I just double-checked), with a notable trial lasting an entire month. In December 1920, the Michigan Supreme Court ruled in favor of Will. The court affirmed that his company—the Kellogg Toasted Corn Flake Company—had the exclusive right to use the “Kellogg” name on prepared foods. Dr. John Kellogg was limited to a minor mention of his name in tiny print on the packaging. In 1922, Will’s company took on the current name of the Kellogg Company, and the rest is history.

Next time you find yourself enjoying some cereal, remember it may have taken a slew of lawyers and ten years of legal battles to pave the way for your breakfast.

Justina Veritas prefers to keep her trivial musings separate from her professional writings. You may communicate a message through the Editor-in-Chief at gialisa@gmail.com.