The change from ancient grain to mass milling

Imagine a generation of kids lounging on the living room floor, legs kicked up, while Howdy Doody (a kids show from the 1950s) delivers his lines with perfect timing.

The living room, a testament to mid-century modern aesthetics, hums softly from the hum of the cathode rays. The show takes a break, and a commercial break floods the screen with a guy in a tan suede shirt moving with casual ease under the smothering neon lights of the studio.

A deep voice, full of syrupy confidence, extols the virtues of Wonder Bread and promises that the fluffy, enriched slices will transform the boring sandwich into a highlight. Dinner is called, the TV goes off, but the craving has already taken hold.

They know what their next mission at the supermarket is: to convince their mom that a loaf of Wonder Bread is the key to making their meals as special as the short, magical commercials.

1. from ancient grain to mass processing

Although Wonder Bread today is more of a nostalgic product that evokes memories of mid-century prosperity, it also represents the completion of our nutritional transition from ancient grains to commercial baking. But this change was anything but sudden; it was a slow, almost gradual shift, heavily influenced by technological advances and the omnipresent power of the media. To understand how industrialized grains came to be, you have to take a step back and look at it from a wider perspective.

Grains, those unassuming grass seeds, may seem deceptively simple at first glance - small, hard kernels that could easily be overlooked if they weren't everywhere in our diet. But dig deeper and you'll discover a whole universe within each tiny husk. A grain is a complex, living thing, coated in bran and germ, full of potential. It is a testament to the wonders of nature, made to survive, sprout and multiply.

Catherine Zabinski writes in Amber Waves, that the starchy endosperm serves as an energy store, the bran is a hard protective shell and the germ is a genetic blueprint waiting for the right conditions to wake up and grow. At its core, each grain is a small reflection of the will to live and a central component of our diet, interwoven into the history of our cuisine and agriculture.

In this universe of cereals, there is an important distinction between ancient and traditional varieties, both the result of thousands of years of unintentional but relentless breeding by humans. Ancient grains such as einkorn or emmer are the early varieties that have hardly been changed since the beginnings of agriculture.

They are the genetic foundation of our modern cereals, untouched by industry, and give us a glimpse of the Nutrition of our distant ancestors. Traditional grains, on the other hand, are newer varieties that are not as old as the ancient ones, but have been carefully preserved and passed down through generations. They came about because early farmers selected for certain characteristics - taste, resilience, yield - long before modern genetic engineering existed.

The relationship between farmers and their crops was one of give and take, each understanding the rhythms and needs of the other. Together, ancient and traditional grains nourished human civilization - including Americans - until industrialization. The transition to industrial agriculture came gradually, driven by the mechanization of the Industrial Revolution. Tractors replaced horses, combine harvesters replaced sickles, and agriculture became larger.

2. the miracle grain (through marketing) 

The development of hybrid cereals, made for higher yields and resistance to disease, heralded the beginning of a new era in agriculture. Synthetic fertilizers and chemical pesticides, these wonders of modern chemistry, promised abundance, but at a cost to soil health and biodiversity.

The monoculture system, which focused on efficiency and productivity, took root. As with any product, it only really takes hold once it has been fully and successfully marketed. Howdy Doody's commercials for Wonder Bread were the culmination of a dynamic marketing campaign begun by Elmer Cline in 1921. The bridge that made industrial bread the indispensable and unchallenged standard was not only created by technological progress, says historian Lisa Haushoffer.

Rather, it was „this mythical start in life... hovering somewhere between fact and fiction, between science and superstition, between substance and show... [where] Wonder Bread... became a kind of miracle food.“

Forget the arguments that the American diet became ultra-processed because housewives simply wanted convenience or because evil rich guys wanted to get even richer. To a certain extent, both are true - but most of that change came about because of damn good marketing.

In the mid-20th century, white bread became a symbol of purity and modernity, its snow-white slices embodying a vision of progress and health that was aggressively marketed to the American public. Wonder Bread, with its pristine white, machine-sliced loaves, was the perfect example of this. Advertisements touted the bread not only as a staple food, but as a miracle cure for health problems, thanks to its prescribed fortification with Vitamins and minerals in the flour. The message was clear: white bread was not only clean and healthy, but also scientifically superior.