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Watch Modern Marvels online: Episode 49 Cereal: History In A Bowl

Move over pancakes, step aside bacon! Cereal is arguably the true breakfast king, a $9-billion industry with an indisputable place in pop-culture history. Full of surprise, nostalgia, and fascinating facts, our special celebrates the colorful--and crunchy--saga of a distinctly American breakfast. We see how a Presbyterian minister-turned-health-food-fanatic--Sylvester Graham, of "Graham cracker" fame--turned his countrymen from fried pork breakfasts to grain- and bran-heavy diets in 1824. We reveal the rivalries, tricks, and accidents that turned cereal into a breakfast sensation. And we examine the amazing feats of marketing used to promote the product--from creating iconic characters for packaging, to ingenious prizes that drove consumers to the shelves in droves.

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