“You?” Mother said. “You are going to create a new food?”
If Papa heard the skepticism in Mother’s voice, he chose not to acknowledge it but instead to answer, “I’ve been saved, Ella. Now it’s my purpose to offer healthy foods to other folks. A food that’s easy to prepare and easy to digest. I know I can do it. And I’ll do it right here.”
“C.W.” Mother sighed, as if preparing to patiently reason with a child. “They do that sort of thing at the San, but they have Dr. Kellogg to oversee it all. And teams of doctors and scientists. You really think you can do something like that at home? Alone?”
Papa shrugged, offering me half a grin before he turned back to his rusty toaster. “I’m not alone, Ella. I’ve got Budgie here.”
Chapter 5
Battle Creek, Michigan
Spring 1901
He called it Grape-Nuts. As the new century steamed in with the speed of a freight train, Papa broke wide open a new industry for the American people, and ten years after his arrival in Battle Creek, he had the success and fortune to show for it. It was Papa who had noticed that housewives and mothers did not want to spend hours preparing pancakes and bacon every morning over hot fires, and so he’d given them something we now all knew and ate. We introduced the world to cereal, and with that, the world—starting with breakfast—changed forever.
But Papa didn’t stop at breakfast cereal; he also created a substitute for coffee, a healthy, caffeine-free bran drink he’d called Postum. And just like that, Papa had made tasty new breakfast options that were easier and healthier—and available to every American household for a fraction of the old effort and prices.
One afternoon, I returned home to a piece of paper with his tidy, familiar handwriting on it: “Dearest Budgie: See me in the office.”
I smiled. I lived for notes such as this one, summonses after the school day and the walk back home. Not only because they meant an invitation to join him out in the white barn, but also because these summonses took me away from Leila, my tiresome companion who worked in part as my after-school tutor and in part as Papa’s secretary. At twenty-two years old, Leila was closer in age to my fourteen years than she was to Papa’s forty-six, but she behaved as if she were a mother figure. With her wide brown eyes and her quick, lively opinions—offered on all matters pertaining to the household, it seemed, whether solicited or not—Leila’s presence was entirely opposite to that of my mother. It overtook the house, in the same way the scent of her Pears soap and overly sweet perfume, a mixture of cherries and vanilla, filled each room. And yet, Mother seemed each day to be yielding bits of her status as “lady of the house” to the irksome young woman.
“Oh, Marjorie, my dear.” As if on cue, my companion entered the room and saw me. “I didn’t hear you come in. Well then, let’s get started on your schoolwork, shall we? And then your chores. I don’t think the chickens have been checked since this morning when—”
“Can’t right now, Leila, sorry. I’ve got to—”
“Now, Marjorie, don’t you argue with me, young lady,” Leila interrupted, her tone suddenly imperious, even as her features held tight to her smile.
“Papa’s orders,” I said, waving his note as my victory flag. “He wants me out at the barn.”
Leila’s limpid smile slid ever so slightly, but before she could reply, I turned on my heels and skipped out of the room, making my way toward the back door and out into the yard.
I breathed in deep, relishing the mild spring afternoon and its wash of country smells—thawing mud, the fires cooking in Papa’s workrooms, the familiar aroma of the dairy farms that surrounded Battle Creek. It felt good to be out of the house, where I no longer had to listen to Leila or worry about my footsteps disturbing Mother. “Marjorie, I am trying to rest,” had become her constant refrain. But even more than the escape from schoolwork or Leila or Mother, I loved these notes because they meant I was invited to go see Papa, and that always meant some exciting—and often unforeseen—adventure.
“Papa!” I shouted happily as I skipped into the big white barn, one of my favorite spots on the family farm that Papa and Mother had bought together and the building that Papa had turned into his main factory and warehouse for his popular Grape-Nuts cereal and Postum bran drink. “I got your note—I’m here!” Papa was always happy to see me, and he’d often halt whatever it was that he was doing and run to scoop me up into a full-bodied twirl.