The Cereal Botanist

Transcript

Welcome to MN90: Minnesota History in 90 Seconds.

Long before inventing puffed rice, Alexander P. Anderson was looking closely at something most people take for granted, plants. Anderson, born in 1862, grew up on a farm near Red Wing. But in his adult years, he left farming for the University of Minnesota. He studied plant physiology, including how plants moved and lost water, and even built scientific instruments to measure those changes. His curiosity eventually carried him to Germany, where he continued his studies at the University of Munich. Then came New York. By the early 1900s, Anderson was working with botanical collections and experimenting with something microscopic: starch grains, bananas, and potatoes. He suspected that water was trapped inside starch and had the potential to behave in interesting ways under heat and pressure. In 1904, he brought his invention to the World's Fair in St. Louis. There, he used enormous cannon-like machines to puff rice in front of crowds. The demonstration was such a hit that Anderson's invention helped launch the commercial puffed-cereal industry. Alexander P. Anderson hadn't set out to invent puffed rice. He was just trying to understand plants.

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