Sylvester Graham

The American diet has been under attack for nearly two centuries, mainly for its fatty, meat-based content. Like George J. Drews and his unfired or raw food diet (see 10/26/14 post), Sylvester Graham advocated a vegetarian diet. Graham’s diet was not quite as strict, however, since he did allow baked whole grains. However, it was a bland diet that didn’t allow spices–not even pepper.

Graham also urged lifestyle changes that held controversial elements during the 1830s when he introduced his theories on healthy living: Graham wanted people to eat only two small meals a day, get plenty of fresh air, exercise, and sunshine, and bathe regularly.

Graham Considered Bread of Prime Importance in the Diet

Graham’s concern was not medical so much as moral; his healthy diet would overcome Americans’ sexual urges, which were stimulated by the prevailing diet of meat and fat.

Graham considered sex harmful to the body, and thought that sexual desire was America’s greatest health scourge. He particularly railed against masturbation, and like many others of his day believed that it caused insanity by inflaming the brain.

In 1898, Nabisco Became the First National Manufacturor of Graham Crackers

Graham concentrated his food campaign on America’s bread, which was no longer always made at home because of growing industrialization. Graham believed bakeries created an inferior product with additives like copper, clay, alum, and chalk, and that the new white bread was particularly unhealthy. Graham developed his own whole wheat flour mixture, which he made into Graham bread. This flour was also used to make mild tasting Graham crackers which have since developed into refined, sugary treats that would have dismayed the man who gave them his name.

One of Graham’s supporters, John Harvey Kellogg, made his own contribution to the American diet when he created corn flakes by accident in 1894.