10 Bizarre Breakfast Cereals You Won't Believe Ever Existed

May 9, 2014— -- For decades, foods that are kid-oriented have had the potential to be serious gold mines, with breakfast cereals at the top of the heap. But for every Golden Grahams and Lucky Charms, there have been dozens that have been forgotten to history, many with good reason. Some of these cereals were just plain bizarre, even bordering on disturbing, and we’ve tracked down 10 of them.

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The earliest breakfast cereals were rather utilitarian affairs. Cold cereal as we know it was invented by John Harvey Kellogg (a name you might recognize) for patients at his sanitarium in Battle Creek, Mich., a place where they could go for rest, exercise, water therapy, a vegetarian diet, and abstinence from caffeine and alcohol. In 1891 he acquired a patent for his corn flakes, a more austere and healthy alternative to the usual breakfasts of the day, which included ham, eggs, biscuits, and the like. In 1895 he took it national, and it took off.

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Almost immediately, other companies started turning out their own breakfast cereals. In 1898 a former patient of Kellogg’s named Charles W. Post introduced his own invention, which he called Grape-Nuts, and that took off as well. In 1924 the newly-consolidated General Mills introduced Wheaties, and in the 1930s a puffed rice cereal (the first) named Kix went on the market.

In later decades manufacturers began to realize that they were neglecting arguably their biggest market: kids. So they boosted the sugar content, introduced a wacky mascot, and voilà. They were really off to the races: hundreds of different children’s cereals were rolled out from the 1950s onwards, with no real template for what would work and what wouldn’t. Marketing teams and ad agencies devised elaborate storylines for the mascots, often played out over decades-long advertising campaigns (In the 1970s, it was revealed that Tony the Tiger was Italian-American, and audiences were introduced to Mama Tony, Mrs. Tony, and even his daughter, Antoinette).

It’s a long, strange trip through the decades of failed breakfast cereals; it really seems like they threw everything they could think of at the wall and waited to see what stuck. Many of the ones that didn’t stick are hilariously bizarre, so read on to learn about 10 of them.

Sir Grapefellow

There was once a time when there were multiple grape-flavored cereals on the market for some reason, and this one differentiated itself by naming itself after a fictional knighted gentleman who enjoyed flying airplanes with no hands. The most intriguing part of the whole thing is this supposed “air car.”

OKs

How eating what’s basically a bowl of Cheerios with some “K”s added to it amounts to a super-jacked Scottish man (possibly named Big Otis?) is beyond us. Either way, we have a feeling that this cereal was just OK.

Click here for 8 more cereals you won't believe ever actually actually existed.