Throughout the first half of the 20th Century, most Americans and especially those in Pensacola remembered the beverage called "Postum." Postum was a powdered roasted-grain beverage that was popular as a coffee substitute. The caffeine-free beverage was created by Post Cereal Company founder Charles William Post in 1895. Mr. Post was a disciple of John Harvey Kellogg and had come to believe that caffeine was unhealthy. Kellogg is best known today for developing the breakfast cereal "corn flakes" that was originally intended to be an anaphrodisiac (reduces libido). His creation of the cereal literally changed "the American breakfast' forever." In the meantime, Mr. Post's company eventually evolved into General Foods, which eventually merged into Kraft Foods.
The original version was changed to an "instant" drink mix in 1912. The product is made from roasted wheat bran, wheat, and molasses. Two flavors were added to the original flavor by introducing a "coffee" and a "cocoa" selection. His product made tremendous financial gains for the Post Company. They even came up with an advertising strategy that warned the public against coffee and its evil caffeine while promoting all the collective benefits of Postum. When other companies tried to imitate it, Post created a cheaper drink under a different name until the other companies gave up an left. During WWI and WWII coffee was rationed to the point that America began looking around for a substitute. The company answered the nation's request by advertising Postum as a substitute even though they confessed to the public that it "did not taste like coffee!"
It was also advertised to those religious organizations that restricted the use of caffeine as a drug, such as the Seventh-day Adventists. It became so popular that the US government used the name "Postum" as a code name for polonium. This element was used in nuclear weapon initiators. The descendent company of "Kraft" discontinued Postum in 2007. Then in May of 2012, Kraft sold the trademark and trade secret to the Eliza’s Quest Food Company. They in turn, began selling Postum through their Postum.com website. As of January 2013, Eliza's Quest Food began returning Postum to the grocery stores shelves all across the United States and Canada.
Charles William Post (1854-1914)
Pensacola News Journal 6-18-1918
Postum AD 1910 (Contributed by The Technical
World Magazine 1910, wikimedia)