Guide Note

Many people start the day with a bowl of their favorite cold breakfast cereal. Breakfast cereal was first developed as a way to get more fiber into the average person's diet. Before the advent of breakfast cereals in the late 1800s, most people's breakfast consisted of eggs and meat, with little in the way of fiber to help digestion. The first breakfast cereals were so dense in fiber that they had to be soaked for hours in milk or water before they became soft enough to eat. Today, breakfast cereals are often high in sugar, preservatives and food coloring, but they can still be part of a healthy diet.

Fast Facts

1. First breakfast cereal: Granula
2. Best selling cereal: General Mills brands
3. Commonly eaten with milk

James Caleb Jackson gets credit for inventing the first breakfast cereal, called Granula. Shortly after, brothers John Harvey and Will Kellogg invented the wheat flake and the corn flake and founded the Kellogg Company. Around the same time, Charles William Post invented Grape Nuts.

The mascots of cereals are just as beloved as the cereals themselves. Some popular ones are:

1. Frosted Flakes: Tony the Tiger
2. Rice Krispies: Snap, Crackle and Pop
3. Cap'n Crunch: Cap'n Crunch
4. Trix: Rabbit
5. Lucky Charms: Lucky the Leprechaun