The Great American Cereal Book: How Breakfast Got Its Crunch

Came in excellent time, book slightly bashed on arrival. But nothing bad at all. Lovely book!

The book is great quality with lots of interesting facts and pictures. I am really glad I bought this for my friend who LOVES american cereal... if only the cereal's were still available at the supermarket.It's a good coffee table book but that's about it; there is not a great deal to read given the size and thickness. Nonethless, I like it :)

I believe there are three levels of coffee table books.On the first level is the book you put out to look like a cultured fancy pants. You really don't like the book, and the people who come to your home really don't like it either, but they go through the motions of leafing through it, as a social custom more than anything. This is the level in which you find your Frank Lloyd Wright retrospectives and your selected Georgia O'Keefe female parts flowers.On the second level is the book that anyone will have a passing interest in. The book caught your eye in the bookstore; you flipped a few pages, found it interesting enough, and brought it home. Anyone who comes over can browse it contentedly. This level is where we find the brightly colored rainforests photography collections and various other natural phenomena.But on the third and highest level is the book that is so great, not only will people gravitate toward it excitedly as soon as they put butt to cushion, but will shriek with joy more than once throughout your chitchatty dinner party preamble. This is the kind of book that people will connect with on a personal level. Firmly situated on level three is where you will find The Great American Cereal Book.This tome of the most American of breakfast products charts the rise, and occasional falls, of the American cereal industry from its humble beginnings at a sanitarium in New York in the late 1800s. It is the passion product of authors Marty Gitlin and Topher Ellis, 15 years in the making.Chock-full of facty goodness, there is something delightful on every page. Hundreds of cereals are broken down and catalogued meticulously. Included in the cereal bios are facts about the manufacturers, debut and discontinuation dates, advertising mascots, and any other interesting marbits the compilers could dig up.The artistry of cereal box design is pushed to the forefront as well, with fantastic full page photos of boxes old and new. Ok so maybe with WWF Superstars cereal, artistry might not be the exact word. But you know what I mean.Peppered throughout the book are asides which explore topics more in-depth such as Cap'n Crunch's life story (It's way more detailed then you might think) or the origin of the aforementioned "marbit," those delightfully dry marshmallows originally found in Lucky Charms.All of the classics are here (Cheerios, Kaboom, Corn Flakes, Rice Crispies) as well as the strike-while-the iron-is-hot ephemera of pop culture (C-3PO's, Bill and Ted's Excellent Cereal, Urkel-O's, Nintendo Cereal System). Indeed, something for everybody.I cannot recommend The Great American Cereal Book highly enough. It is an epically researched and wonderfully fun collection that every leftover-milk-slurping American should own.Plunk it on your coffee table, sit back, and enjoy the squeals of delight and nostalgic conversing that is sure to follow. You might also want to stock up on some Frankenberry just in case.

Buen libro sobre los packakings de cajas de cereales que han aparecido en los USA durante años. Desde los primeros mas sobrios a luego la invasión ochentera de productos franquicia (cazafantasmas, barbie, spiderman). Todas las cajas reproducidas a buen tamaño y el libro es bastante grande de paginas así que hay una gran colección. Eso, el precio y el diseño del libro que emula una propia caja de cereales hacen que esta compra sea obligada para curiosos y diseñadores

Fantastic walk down memory lane for my dad who spent decades in the cereal business!

This book offers a lot. It's a fascinating history of the American cereal industry with geeked out facts about hundreds of cereals; When the products were on the market, the type of cereal, related brands, factoids and more. There are some very obscure cereals covered too: Dinky Donuts, Crazy Cow, Cheyenne Corn - the vastness of the number of brands to grace supermarket shelves is astounding,The Great American Cereal Book is also a beautiful book with a ton of high quality package shots. The book layout and design are wonderful. There's a humorous approach that's appropriate for the subject matter without going overboard. The shimmering gaudiness that is the American cereal industry comes through on its own.

I wish that the pictures were bigger and that they were all in color. Otherwise it is an entertaining and somewhat informative book.