Source http://www.postchronicle.com/news/strange/article_212122427.shtml

Postum addicts among Mormons in Utah are looking for a new way to get a caffeine-free fix now that Kraft Foods has discontinued the cereal beverage.

Postum was invented in 1895 by C.W. Post, a Seventh Day Adventist and founder of the cereal company that bore his name.

Both Adventists and members of the Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter-day Saints eschew coffee and tea, along with liquor and cigarettes.

I hadn't heard. I'm in mourning too!!

I am not sure Post became an Adventist.... did he?

I am not sure Post became an Adventist either. If Kraft Foods had marketed Postum at all I am sure it would have maintained itself profitable. International Foods is still making a profit off from Cafix and Pero. Kraft didn't even put a new label on Postum.

But economically they probably discontinued Postum because it wasn't profitable. There are so many cereal-based non-caffeinated beverages now on the market, especially available in health food stores.

I don't know if C. W. Post was an Adventist. (Where would we go to research that?)

Try here: History of C W Post

Interesting story, and no, he does not appear to have been an Adventist.

Graeme

For fun, check out the prices of Postum on eBay. $30 for an 8oz jar in some listings!! Stock up now before is hits the price of a barrel of oil.

Has any one visited Mrs Gray's last resting place to listen for a whirring sound as she spins???

I have.....It sounded like she was grinding up some coffee beans....

I'm sad to hear that postum will be taken off the market. As for it's history, according to my Bible classes at AUC and Andrews and what I've read, it was actually invented by Dr. Kellogg for the Battle Creek San. Post was an Athiest, and a failed business man who had a break down and became a patient at the san.

Post would walk around and look at Kelloggs inventions and improvements such as Postum and cornflakes and decided to steal his ideas and sell to the general public. He marked cornflakes as "C. W. Post Cornflakes" At first Kellogg did not care about his ideas being stolen, although his brother W. K. Kellogg did. Dr. Kellogg was focused on the san and his paients. He tended to treat his brother in an unkind way, such as making his brother run to take dictation while Dr. Kellogg would be riding his bike.

W. K. Kellogg left and started the Kellogg's cerial company. There was a big war over cornflakes. W. K. had printed on his boxes "The original and best" Post suied Kellogg over this statement. Kellogg countersued since his brother was the inventer and won and the court said that Post had to take the name "C. W. Post" off the box for a certan number of years, and could only have the company logo "Post". As Dr. Kellogg saw how much money was in the cerials he sued both Post and his brother. Since it was based on Ellen White's counsel the General conference was preparing to sue all three, both Kelloggs and Post, but Mrs. White put a stop to it saying let tithe and offerings support the church, not the cornflake. (Sadly in the years since, everytime something marketable is developed in the church, which we could benifit from, some fundamentalist pulls out this quote and the church has lost a fortune by going to a proof text and taking it out of context)

In the 1970's Post produced a mixed grain and I think some fruit and nuts cerial and called it "C. W. Post" it was because the court order to keep his name off the box ran out and in his will he requested his name to be put on the box when the time was up.