James Caleb Jackson

{{Infobox person

| name = James Caleb Jackson

| image = File:James Caleb Jackson1.jpg

| caption =

| birth_date = {{Birth date|1811|3|28}}

| birth_place = Manlius, Onondaga County, New York, U.S.

| death_date = {{Death date and age|1895|7|11|1811|3|28}}

| death_place = Dansville, New York, U.S.

| death_cause =

| known_for = Inventing Granula

| education =

| occupation = Nutritionist

| spouse = Lucretia Edgerton Brewster

| partner =

| children = James Hathaway Jackson

| parents =

| relatives = Katharine Johnson Jackson (daughter-in-law)

}}

James Caleb Jackson (March 28, 1811 – July 11, 1895) was an American nutritionist and the inventor of the first dry, whole grain breakfast cereal which he called Granula.{{cite book|author=William Lloyd Garrison|title=A House Dividing Against Itself 1836–1840|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0ojhsW0VgooC&pg=PA577|access-date=April 6, 2012|date=June 1, 1971|publisher=Harvard University Press|isbn=978-0-674-52661-7|pages=577–}} His views influenced the health reforms of Ellen G. White, a founder of the Seventh-day Adventist Church.Ronald Numbers (1992). Prophetess of Health: Ellen G. White and the Origins of Seventh-Day Adventist Health Reform. University of Tennessee Press.

Biography

Jackson was born in Manlius, Onondaga County, New York, to James and Mary Ann Elderkin Jackson.{{cite book |last1=Quick |first1=F.I. |title=Dansville: Historical, Biographical, Descriptive |date=1902 |publisher=Instructor Publishing Co. |location=Dansville, N.Y. |pages=176–180 |url=https://archive.org/details/dansvillehistori00bunn/page/n185/ |access-date=August 24, 2020}} He "spent time" at the Manlius School.{{cite journal

|title=The Gerrit Smith Circle: Abolitionism in the Burned-Over District

|first=Lawrence J.

|last=Friedman

|journal=Civil War History

|date=March 1980

|volume=26

|number=1

|pages=18–38

|doi=10.1353/cwh.1980.0009

|s2cid=144487199

|url=https://content.ebscohost.com/cds/retrieve?content=AQICAHjIloLM_J-oCztr2keYdV8f1ibHmDucods679W_YPnffAEZlHNG6x7_QCwIRByfrEKGAAAA2DCB1QYJKoZIhvcNAQcGoIHHMIHEAgEAMIG-BgkqhkiG9w0BBwEwHgYJYIZIAWUDBAEuMBEEDHo4gzBzP8pnTTNbbAIBEICBkOJUrOraxj4rE2SzVchZYwbuUFqxoUMKjs1EBmH58xyrZ5bEwPMcjnQextz_8beSzsRZw1QwlZaLMNoEHY_bDPJgtV2MyAe4OghEYnzu9hq0j1tzFax4d14XZCxglpeq5uwBkU3Uk2vEZY8Ato-oo9H8jfQ2yo4VE05f1WzBQMIzlAQeJS3ERFdRKVvwNXCmMA==}}{{rp|20}} After completing his education at Chittenango Polytechnic Institute, he worked as a farmer until 1838. He married Lucretia Edgerton Brewster when he was 19 years old. In his early life, Jackson was active as an abolitionist. He lectured for the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society, becoming the society's secretary in 1840. With Nathaniel P. Rogers, starting in 1840 he edited the National Anti-Slavery Standard for about a year. In 1844, with Abel Brown he bought the abolitionist newspaper the Albany Patriot. Jackson managed and wrote for the paper until 1847, when his failing health forced him to retire.{{Citation needed|date=October 2022}}

Jackson had been troubled with poor health throughout his life, but he experienced a remarkable recovery after taking a 'water cure' at a spa operated by Silas O. Gleason, the Greenwood Spring Water Cure in Cuba, New York, in 1846–1847.{{cite book |last1=Cayleff |first1=Susan |title=Wash and Be Healed: The Water-Cure Movement and Women's Health |date=2010 |publisher=Temple University Press |location=Philadelphia |pages=114–115 |isbn=9781439904275 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=PtpyJgRT5gcC |access-date=August 25, 2020}} As a result, he spent the second half of his life as an advocate for hydropathy, training to become a physician and opening a hydropathic institute at Glen Haven on Skaneateles Lake in Cortland County, New York, in 1847.{{cite book

|chapter=Cazenovia Fugitive Slave Law Convention, August 21–22, 1850

|title=Proceedings of the Black State Conventions, 1840–1865

|editor-first1=Philip S.

|editor-last1=Foner

|editor-link1=Philip S. Foner

|editor-first2=George E.

|editor-last2=Walker

|location=Philadelphia

|publisher=Temple University Press

|year=1979

|volume=1

|isbn=0877221456

|pages=43–53, at p. 51}}

In 1858, he took over the 'Our Home Hygienic Institute' at Dansville, Livingston County, New York. The spa had been founded by Nathaniel Bingham on the site of a mineral water spring some four years earlier. Under Jackson's management, the spa grew to become one of the largest in the world, catering to around 20,000 patients, and was renamed 'Our Home on the Hillside'. Jackson was assisted by his wife, known as "Mother Jackson", and their adopted daughter, Dr. Harriet Newell Austin.{{cite book |last= Cayleff |first= Susan E. |title=Wash and Be Healed: The Water-Cure Movement and Women's Health |year= 1991 |publisher= Temple University Press |location= Philadelphia |pages=94–95 |isbn= 9781439904275 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_FjLO6DwwhMC&q=%22Wash+and+Be+Healed:%22 |access-date=August 22, 2020}} The health resort was a Jackson family operation for many years; James Hathaway Jackson (son of James Caleb Jackson) and James Arthur Jackson (son of James Hathaway Jackson and grandson of James Caleb Jackson) were both leaders of the facility.{{cite book |title=The Jackson Sanatorium |date=1890 |location=Dansville, NY |url=https://archive.org/details/jacksonsanatoriu00buff/page/n5/ |access-date=August 24, 2020}} The family referred to it as the Jackson Sanatorium by 1890; the establishment was also known as the Jackson Health Resort.

Along with water cures, Jackson believed that diet was fundamental in improving health. Over time, he removed red meat from the menu at the spa and ruled out tea, coffee, alcohol, and tobacco. Jackson was a vegetarianForward, Charles W. (1898). Fifty Years of Food Reform: A History of the Vegetarian Movement in England. London: The Ideal Publishing Union. p. 66 and promoted a vegetarian diet with emphasis on fruits, vegetables, and unprocessed grains. Jackson believed his diet could cure intemperance and masturbation.Mrozek, Donald J. (1987). The Scientific Quest for Physical Culture and the Persistent Appeal of Quackery. Journal of Sport History 14 (1): 76-86. Although accepting the use of surgery, he opposed drugs. Jackson was opposed to abortion in any circumstance, describing it as "among the greatest crimes".Mohr, James C. (1978). Abortion in America: The Origins and Evolution of National Policy. Oxford University Press. p. 172. {{ISBN|0-19-502249-1}}

In 1863, he developed the first breakfast cereal and named it Granula.{{cite news |title= Who Made That Granola? |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/25/magazine/who-made-that-granola.html |quote=In 1863, Dr. James Caleb Jackson, a health reformer who believed illness was rooted in the stomach, began experimenting with cold cereal to augment the mineral-spring treatments at his sanitarium in upstate New York. ... |newspaper=New York Times |date=March 23, 2012 |access-date=December 23, 2013}}

Jackson died on July 11, 1895, in Dansville, Livingston County, New York.{{Citation needed|date=October 2022}}

Publications

1822 Morning Watches
1853 Hints on the Reproductive Organs: Their Diseases, Causes, and Cure on Hydropathic Principles
1862 Consumption: How to Prevent It, and How to Cure It
1862 [https://archive.org/details/sexualorganisma00jackgoog/page/n13 The Sexual Organism, and Its Healthful Management]
1863 [https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/100695387 Dancing: Its Evils and Its Benefits]
1870 American Womanhood: Its Peculiarities and Necessities
1871 [https://archive.org/details/howtotreatsickw00jackgoog/page/n11 How to Treat the Sick Without Medicine]
1872 The Training of Children
1872 The Debilities of Our Boys
1875 Christ as a Physician
1879 [http://medicolegal.tripod.com/jackson1879.htm Tobacco and Its Effect upon the Health and Character of Those Who Use It]