Speaking of Sports

By John Fragodt, Sports Reporter

Cereals just aren’t the same anymore.  I remember back in the old days when eating cereal was an event in and of itself.  If you were lucky enough to be the first one to open a box, you had the chance to dig inside the box and find a lucky prize.  It wasn’t much, but anytime you got something free, you took it.  The prizes used to be found inside all the cereal, but once someone figured out it was kind of gross for hands to be digging in the cereal boxes, the prizes were placed between the cereal lining package and the cardboard box.

Even if you weren’t the first one to get to a new box of cereal to get the prize in a small plastic bag, almost all cereal boxes had games, trivia, puzzles and more to play on the cardboard box.  Just turn the box around while you were eating and you could keep yourself busy playing games.  Can you imagine kids nowadays doing that?  No way; they’re too busy checking out their own cell phones or computers and why would they play on the cereal box anyway when they can play any game they want on their own cell phone?

The type of cereal was very important, too.  Remember, there weren’t too many sugar-coated cereals back then and there weren’t too many varieties to choose from.  Plus, those new sugar-coated cereals used to be a little more expensive so when my Mom did buy some of the newer cereals, I had to be quick or I’d get the last of the box.

The late 1950s and early 1960s are referred to as the Golden Age of Cereal and that’s when a lot of new cereals and sugar-coated cereals came out.  A lot of cereals had ‘sugar’ as part of the name when they first came out, but the word was dropped later when anything to do with too much sugar was considered negative.

Shredded Wheat was a staple of almost every kitchen back in the 1950s and 1960s, along with Cheerios, Rice Krispies and, oh yeah, a lot of sugar.  That was one of the best parts of eating cereal; getting to the bottom of the bowl and having nothing but sugar and milk to finish up on.  Grape Nuts was a new brand around then and, if your teeth could get through the crunching, it was actually a favorite of mine for a while; that is, with a lot of sugar.

Sugar-coated cereals made their way into the American kitchen in the late 1950s to the early 1970s and so did a lot of hot cereals like Malt a Meal and Cream of Wheat (another of my favorites).

Yes, who could forget the arrival of Cap’n Crunch, Alpha Bits, Frosted Flakes, Honeycomb and one of the best cereals of all time, Quisp.  Do they even sell Quisp any more?  Growing up, those were possibly my favorite five cereals of all time and I still enjoy Cap’n Crunch and Frosted Flakes to this day.

As I got older, the mix of crunch berries, Count Chocula, Fruity Pebbles and the such, came around, but I never did like eating chocolate for my cereal and I always hated the rainbow of colors in my milk at the bottom of my bowl.  Heck, I liked adding my own sugar; I didn’t need someone else to do it for me.  What will be the new top cereal of the 2020s and 2030s?  Not sure, but I bet there won’t be any prizes inside. 

(Note:  Can you remember any of your favorites?

Here are some dates for when some popular cereals debuted: 1910s-Corn Flakes; 1920s-Wheaties; 1930s-Chex; 1940s-Cheerios; 1950s-Sugar Frosted Flakes (dropped sugar later), Trix, Alpha-Bits; 1960s-Cap’n Crunch, Total, Life, Lucky Charms, Honeycomb, Froot Loops; 1970s-Fruity Pebbles and Cocoa Pebbles, Nature Valley Granola, Count Chocula; 1980s-Crispix, Cinnamon Toast Crunch and Honey Bunches of Oats; 1990s-Mostly limited edition cereals and other cereals with flavors like Marshmallow Alpha-Bits, Rice Krispies Treats, etc.

In the 2000s and into the current, cereals have gone down in popularity so there haven’t been as many new popular cereals.  In addition, people are questioning the health benefits of some cereals, so sugar-coated is not very popular, and new ideas for new cereals are lacking).