Dr. John Harvey Kellogg invented corn flakes at his Michigan sanitarium to suppress sexual desire, but refused to add sugar. His younger brother Will stole the recipe in 1906, sweetened it, and launched a competing company. They fought in court for over a decade and never spoke again, even after John tried to reconcile near the end of his life.
Two brothers accidentally invented what would become the foundation of American breakfast for almost a century, but along the way they got into such a squabble that they ended up never speaking again for the rest of their lives. And their fight went all the way to the Michigan Supreme Court. Dr. John Harvey Kellogg ran what was called a sanitarium, which was a fancy health clinic for rich people in Battle Creek, Michigan in the late 1800s. And he had a wild belief that food could actually suppress sexual urges. See, Kellogg was the type of guy who was allergic to fun. No caffeine, no no alcohol, no tobacco, and no sex. He believed that if you ate very bland food, it would suppress your sexual desires. And his first invention to help with that was called Corn Flakes. And that was a result of a mistake they had made making a batch of cereal for people. John's younger brother, Will, had worked for his, his brother for over 25 years helping make cereal. And while John saw cereal as medicine, no sugar, no fun, Basically, Will saw it as a business. That's how much the people he was feeding it to had loved it. And when Will wanted to add sugar to Corn Flakes, John refused. So Will, in 1906, bought a copy of the recipes from his brother, walked out, and started his own cereal business. Both brothers were named Kellogg, so they each started making cereal with the Kellogg name on it. John sued Will, Will sued John, and it was a mess. The battle would last over a decade and eventually go to the Supreme Court of Michigan. And finally, in 1920, The Michigan Supreme Court ruled that younger brother Will was the real Kellogg and would get to put his name on his cereal. Decades later, at age 91, as he was dying, John wrote a letter to his younger brother Will asking him to reconcile. John's secretary at the time read it and was so humiliated on behalf of John that he never sent it to Will. And the brothers died without ever talking to each other. And we all know Kellogg's and their famous Corn Flakes and all the other cereals would go on to become one of the biggest consumer product companies on earth over the coming decades. But Will built the whole thing on one thing, John never allowed— sugar. And I did a deeper dive into how that decision to add sugar to cereal eventually doomed the entire cereal industry, where today it's basically over. You can find a link to that deep dive video in the comments below.
