Of course, Will’s life was no Hollywood movie. He lived another three long years after receiving his brother’s posthumous blessing. Almost every day was filled with painful ailments and infirmities. During the summer of 1951, Will developed severe anemia, most likely caused by a chronic form of leukemia. He required frequent, rushed visits to the hospital for blood transfusions, some of which caused severe reactions that threatened his health almost as much as the anemia the transfusions were supposed to correct. Will’s last months were mostly confined to the second floor of his home overlooking Gull Lake. The only people he allowed into his bedroom suite were his daughter, Beth, his grandson Kenneth, and his private nurses who attended to his every need.41
In mid-September, Will was admitted to the Leila Hospital, which, ironically, was named for its benefactress, Leila Post Montgomery, who was the former private secretary, second wife, and widow of Will’s archenemy, C. W. Post. It was there that he spent the final three weeks of his life. Lying uncomfortably in bed and unable to sleep, the old man quietly told his loyal nurse, Elsie Gay Hoatson, “It won’t be long now.”42 His last hours were spent in the company of his daughter, Beth, Nurse Hoatson, and his chauffeur, John Elbon. At one point during the vigil, Will appeared to recognize Beth but was “too weak to talk.”43 He fell into a coma and at three o’clock in the afternoon of Saturday, October 6, 1951, Will Keith Kellogg passed away.44 He was ninety-one and six months of age.
W. K. Kellogg’s obituary in The Battle Creek Enquirer and News, October 7, 1951 Credit 132
According to Will’s wishes, there was no public service. “I do not care to be written up in the paper in the manner in which Mr. ——— was….I do not want any long drawn-out sermon or eulogy of any sort,” he said in 1933, “the expenses should not exceed $500….No flowers…[and]…burial should take place at Oak Hill cemetery after cremation.”45 Much more than $500 was spent on Will’s sendoff and, of course, his death was “written up” on the front pages of newspapers, filled the air with radio and television broadcasts, and sparked conversations around the world.
Beginning at 4:00 p.m. on Monday the 8th and lasting until 10 a.m. the following morning, Will’s embalmed body was placed on a bier in the Kellogg factory’s main lobby so that each shift of employees could pay their respects. Some three thousand townspeople also came and they were ushered by employees who had worked at the plant for twenty-five or more years. All the other Kellogg cereal plants around the world shut down their operations for twenty-four hours on October 9 in honor of the company’s founder. United States senators and congressmen; the governor of Michigan, G. Mennen Williams; President Harry Truman; and many other men and women of great distinction all wired their condolences to the Kellogg family. The mayor of Battle Creek, William B. Bailey, declared a week of mourning and ordered all the flags in the city to fly at half-staff. On October 9, the family held a private ceremony at Battle Creek’s First Congregational Church. And on October 11, his white, lambskin-leather-aproned and white-gloved “brothers” from the Battle Creek Free and Accepted Mason Lodge No. 12 ceremoniously interred Will Kellogg’s ashes.46
The two brothers’ proximity in death at the Oak Hill Cemetery defies the monumental distance they constructed in life. Decades before, when they were closer allied, or at least worked closely together, the Kellogg brothers purchased matching tombstones, simple small slabs of granite with only enough room to announce their names and years on the planet. Eventually Will ordered his tombstone to be removed and purchased a nearby and much larger plot. There, two black wrought iron gates welcome visitors to a blue-slate-covered burial ground. Each gate bears the famous script “K” that begins the red “Kellogg’s” label on every box of Will’s cereals. In the center of the double row of grave markers is a bronze sundial featuring a bird’s wings with an hourglass in the center. It is inscribed with Will’s favorite adage, “The early bird gets the worm.” To Will, the virtue of being an “early bird” was clear, especially when it came to realizing the profitability of making ready-to-eat cereals for the masses. Perhaps ten paces away rests the elder brother who never completely appreciated the genius of either his brother or that fundamental point, until it was too late.47
Forty-eight years after Will’s funeral, his grandson Norman Jr. recalled that few family members wept, “with the possible exception of my mother,” who “nevertheless felt a welcome relief from her father’s heavy handed paternalism,” and “perhaps my brother Kenneth.”48 “On the contrary,” Norman Jr. wrote, “most felt a great sense of relief as though a heavy weight had been lifted from them. Now they were free to do as they pleased without a stern patriarch forbidding them.”49 This grandson’s belated eulogy articulates, perhaps, the saddest story ever to emerge from the storied town of Battle Creek.
—
BOTH KELLOGG BROTHERS made a great deal of money during their careers but only one had much to show for it by the time he died. The doctor used his income freely to fund his new food creations, mechanical inventions, book publishing ventures, charitable missions, job training programs, soup kitchens for the destitute, a missionary medical school, various research, eugenics, and public health projects, and his “university of health,” the Battle Creek Sanitarium. John Harvey Kellogg may not have always looked before he spent, spoke, or acted but he was generous to a fault. Sadly, the vast majority of his philanthropic, missionary, and medical work, both good and bad, is either extinct or gathering dust in the archives. Too few people today recall the name John Harvey Kellogg and the reverse ought to be true. Those who glibly deride him as a quack have entirely missed the point of his life and work. Although the science, or evidence, underpinning his ideas about “biologic living” have changed, many of his sounder concepts of wellness remain sage prescriptions written out millions of times each day. As narcissistic as he was, it is a safe bet to suggest that Dr. Kellogg would not have minded missing out on the credit for his ideas as long as they were rigorously taught and practiced to the benefit of all humankind. Perhaps one day they will.
Will Kellogg proved to be as shrewd a philanthropist as he was an industrialist. Laboriously amassing his fortune as the years passed, he meticulously designed the W. K. Kellogg Foundation. That it is dedicated to the welfare of children is as much a testimony to his divining the best possible use for his wealth as it was to his loveless youth. His dream of a Kellogg dynasty never came to be because he tended to either fire or discourage each succeeding generation from spending much time at his company or his foundation. As his grandson Norman Jr. noted, his greatest enterprises have been “perpetuated without benefit of his heirs.”50 Nevertheless, it was Will Keith Kellogg, and not his charismatic and once more famous brother, John Harvey Kellogg, who achieved a certain kind of immortality.
What remains indisputable, even if Will and John had great difficulty admitting it, is that their remarkable success was mutually dependent if not outright synergistic. John needed Will to administer and expand his empire of health. He required a businessman to manage the business he found so boring. Even after they acrimoniously dissolved their partnership, Will’s stunning success in the cereal business spurred John to create many other foods and health innovations. Will, in turn, needed John to launch his career as a manager, executive, and business visionary. Perversely, this once subservient bookkeeper used his older brother’s rough turns to drive his relentless hunger for achievement and, of course, introduce him to the possibilities of those toasted flakes of corn.
Equally indisputable, but far more heartrending, is how much these brothers hurt and, at times, hated each other. Theirs was a rancorous disequilibrium that impoverished their lives, diminished their piece of mind, and spilled over onto their relations with friends, colleagues, and family. Such dysfunction was a striking contrast to their mutual quest to achieve a balance of health through sound digestion and diet. They could see the other’s foibles clearly even if they were incapable of contemplating their own. One is tempted to bleat the old En
glish proverb, “great men’s faults are never small.”51 But John and Will’s sister, Emma, explained the dynamic even better when she observed, “the Kellogg men can be mean.”52 In fact, they were human with all the possibilities of failure that membership in our species implies. The psychic costs their flaws imposed upon each other were every bit as dear as their outsized talents, imagination, and lasting impact on the world. All told, this volatile brew constitutes the tragedy and the triumph of the Brothers Kellogg.
Acknowledgments
THIS BOOK HAS A FEW of its roots in a journey I made as a six-year-old boy growing up in suburban Detroit. My first-grade class took a field trip to Battle Creek to tour the Kellogg’s factory. I still have the Tony the Tiger cereal bowl we were each given as souvenirs but the small box of Sugar Frosted Flakes I also received that day was consumed before our school bus turned onto the highway to take us home. If you grew up in Michigan, you could not help but be aware of the Kellogg’s Cereal Company or the beneficence of the Will Keith Kellogg Foundation. Years later, as a medical student at the University of Michigan, I skimmed many of Dr. John Harvey Kellogg’s entertaining health tomes as respite from cramming still another medical textbook into my memory bank. I recall thinking at the time that someone ought to tell the tale of these two extraordinary brothers, never imagining I might be that person.
Personal history aside, there are many people and institutions who helped pave my literary journey to Battle Creek and back. At the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, Francis J. Blouin, the former director; Terrance McDonald, the current director of the Bentley Historical Library; and the Bentley’s medical archivist, Brian Williams, were instrumental in helping me navigate the vast collection of the John Harvey Kellogg papers and sharing their wealth of historical knowledge with me. The University of Michigan’s library staff was critical in helping me obtain hundreds of other documents and reports cited within this book. I am equally grateful to Garth “Duff” Stoltz of the Adventist Heritage Village and Museum in Battle Creek; the archival and library staffs of the Michigan State University Archives in East Lansing; the State of Michigan Archives in Lansing; the Center for Adventist Research, Andrews University, Berrien Springs; George Livingstone and his colleagues at the Willard Public Library of Battle Creek; the Benson Ford Center of the Henry Ford Museum, in Dearborn; the Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.; the National Library of Medicine, Bethesda, Maryland; and the New York Public Library, New York City. For every query and request I made of these superb librarians, there was always a helpful answer that went above and beyond the call of their collective duties. At the University of Michigan Center for the History of Medicine, Dr. J. Alexander Navarro, Heidi Mueller, and Brendan Flynn ably assisted me in too many ways to enumerate and I hope my thanks on these pages will suffice to demonstrate my indebtedness for their generosity and support.
Navigating the stormy, and often shark-infested, waters of academia is no easy task. Having done so for more than three decades without yet drowning, I was fortunate in having several true friends and colleagues who were always present for advice, counsel, and simply to listen. I thank Michael Schoenfeldt, John R. Knott Jr., and Arthur J. Vander at the University of Michigan; Martin Cetron of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; Catherine D. Deangelis of Johns Hopkins University; Daniel M. Fox of the Milbank Memorial Fund; William Richardson, president emeritus of the W. K. Kellogg Foundation; David Rosner of Columbia University; and Drs. Sheldon F. Markel and Andrew P. Metinko. They were all thoughtful readers of this book in utero and, more broadly, have enriched my life simply by my knowing them.
My literary agents, Glen Harley and Lynn Chu, of Writers Representatives, remain steadfast and superb shepherds of the publishing process. I am fortunate, indeed, to be represented by such able professionals who are true “book people.”
This is the third book I have completed with my wonderful editor, Victoria Wilson, associate vice president and associate publisher of Alfred A. Knopf/Penguin Random House. Tough, savvy, and uncompromising in the pursuit of good writing and storytelling, her constructive advice and attention to detail has made this volume far better than it might have otherwise been. I would also like to thank her editorial assistant, Ryan Smernoff, for his cheerful help and professionalism; copy editor Fred Chase, for his superb attention to questions of language, grammar, and factual detail; Josephine Kals of the Publicity Department; and to the entire staff at Pantheon who performed their jobs with great ability and insight.
I am proud to acknowledge the assistance of the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation. Beyond the incredible honor of being named a Guggenheim Fellow for 2015, the award afforded me the funds, time, and concentration necessary to complete this book. In 2017, the Rockefeller Foundation awarded me an academic writing residency at their Bellagio Center in Italy, a signal distinction that greatly helped me crystallize my ideas and thoughts about the amazing Kellogg brothers.
Finally, I thank my daughters, Bess and Sammy, for their support and encouragement during the process of writing this book. Authors in the throes of composition tend to be preoccupied when the writing is going well and downright ornery when it is not. Nevertheless, my wonderful girls have never flagged in their support and love for or their belief in me, both during pleasant times and emotional maelstroms, and for that I am both fortunate and grateful.
Howard Markel
Ann Arbor, Michigan
August 2017
Notes
ABBREVIATIONS AND SHORT CITES USED IN THE NOTES
A. S. Bloese Manuscript August S. Bloese, “Manuscript of an unfinished biography of John Harvey Kellogg,” Charles MacIvor Collection, No. 251, Center for Adventist Research, Andrews University, Berrien Springs, Michigan
Carson Gerald Carson, Cornflake Crusade: From the Pulpit to the Breakfast Table (New York: Rinehart, 1957)
Center for Adventist Research Center for Adventist Research, Andrews University, Berrien Springs, Michigan
J. H. Kellogg Papers, MSU John Harvey Kellogg Papers, Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan
J. H. Kellogg Papers, U-M John Harvey Kellogg Papers, Bentley Historical Library, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan
Powell Horace B. Powell, The Original Has This Signature: W. K. Kellogg (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1956)
Schwarz, John Harvey Kellogg Richard W. Schwarz, John Harvey Kellogg, M.D. (Nashville: Southern Publishing Association, 1970)
Schwarz, PhD thesis Richard W. Schwarz, “John Harvey Kellogg: American Health Reformer” (PhD thesis in Modern History, University of Michigan, 1964)
Williamson Jr., An Intimate Glimpse Norman Williamson Jr., An Intimate Glimpse of a Shy Grandparent, W. K. Kellogg (Privately printed, 1999), copy in Bentley Historical Library, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan
INTRODUCTION:
THE CAIN AND ABEL OF AMERICA’S HEARTLAND
1. All told, more than 128 billion bowls of Corn Flakes are consumed each year. The Kellogg Company produces more than 65 million boxes of Corn Flakes annually. See The Kellogg Company, 2014 Annual Report. Letters to Shareowners and SEC Form 10-K. Fiscal Year End: January 3, 2015 (Battle Creek, MI: Kellogg Company, 2015). See also “Kellogg’s to Laser-Brand Individual Corn Flakes,” The Telegraph (Great Britain). October 13, 2009, accessed July 1, 2015, at http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/6316425/Kelloggs-to-laser-brand-individual-Corn-Flakes.html.
2. Dr. Kellogg’s books include: J. H. Kellogg, The Household Manual of Domestic Hygiene, Foods, and Drinks, Common Diseases, Accidents and Emergencies and Useful Hints and Recipes (Battle Creek, MI: The Office of the Health Reformer, 1875); Practical Manual of Health and Temperance Embracing the Treatment of Common Diseases, Accidents, and Emergencies, the Alcohol and Tobacco Habit, Helpful Hints and Recipes (Battle Creek, MI: Good Health Publishing Co., 1885); Plain Facts for Old and Young: Embracing the Natural History and Hygiene of Organic Life (Burlington, Iowa: Senger and Condit
, 1881, 1886, 1887; Battle Creek, MI; Modern Medicine Publishing Co., 1910); Sunbeams of Health and Temperance: An Instructive Account of the Health Habits of All Nations With Interesting Information on All Subjects Relating to Health and Temperance Affording Both Instruction and Entertainment for Young and Old (Battle Creek: MI: Good Health Publishing Co., 1888); Man, the Masterpiece (Burlington, Iowa: Senger and Condit, 1886; Battle Creek, MI: Health Publishing Co.; 1891); Colon Hygiene: Comprising New and Important Facts Concerning the Physiology of the Colon and an Account of Practical and Successful Methods of Combating Intestinal Inactivity and Toxemia (Battle Creek, MI: Good Health Publishing Co., 1916); The Itinerary of a Breakfast: A Popular Account of the Travels of a Breakfast Through the Food Tube and of the Ten Gates and Several Stations Through Which It Passes, Also of the Obstacles Which It Sometimes Meets (Battle Creek, MI: Good Health Publishing Co., 1918); The Crippled Colon: Causes, Consequences, Remedies (Battle Creek, MI: The Modern Medicine Publishing Co., 1931); Why the “Blues”? “Nerves,” Neuralgias, and Chronic Fatigue or Neurasthenia (Battle Creek, MI: Modern Medicine Publishing Co., 3rd edition, 1921); The New Dietetics: A Guide to Scientific Feeding in Health and Disease (Battle Creek, MI: The Modern Medicine Publishing Co., 1921, 1927). Will Durant, the best-selling author of The Story of Philosophy, insisted that The New Dietetics merited inclusion “among the 100 best books ever published.” Will Durant to J. H. Kellogg, February 20, 1929, Reel 3, John Harvey Kellogg Papers, Michigan Historical Collections, Bentley Historical Library, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan (hereinafter J. H. Kellogg Papers, U-M).
The Kelloggs Page 43