Чарльз Уильям Пост: Американдық кәсіпкер және тағам өндірушісі

American businessman (1854–1914)

Charles William Post (October 26, 1854 – May 9, 1914) was an American innovator, breakfast cereal and foods manufacturer and a pioneer in the prepared food industry. He was the founder of what is now Post Consumer Brands.

Post, commonly known as "C. W.", was born October 26, 1854, in Springfield, Illinois, the son of Charles Rollin Post and Caroline Lathrop Post, and grew up in the adopted hometown of Abraham Lincoln, who served as President of the United States during Post's childhood. Post graduated from public schools in Springfield, and then enrolled at Illinois Industrial University, where he remained for two years before leaving without a degree. After a brief stay in Independence, Kansas, Post returned to Springfield, where he remained for over a decade working as a salesman and manufacturer of agricultural machinery. During this interval Post invented and patented several farm implements, including a plow, a harrow, and a hay stacking machine. In a deceitful attempt to have his daughter become closer with his secretary (soon to be wife), C. W. hired her to be a travel companion for Marjorie. When Marjorie realized the ruse, she deeply resented Leila.

Post suffered a mental breakdown in November 1885, the result of the stress and overwork which accompanied his job as a farm implement manufacturer. Post made a break with his previous life, moving to Texas in 1886, where he came into association with a group of real estate developers in Fort Worth, who were attempting to establish a new community on the eastern outskirts of a town called Riverside. In 1888, Post began a real estate development of his own in Fort Worth on that he had obtained, platting the land for streets and homes and constructing two mills. In 1895, Post founded Postum Cereal Co., with his first product, Postum cereal beverage. Post's first breakfast cereal premiered in 1897, and he named the product Grape Nuts cereal because of the fruity aroma noticed during the manufacturing process and the nutty crunch of the finished product. In 1904, he followed up the Grape Nuts label with a brand of corn flakes, which was first called Elijah's Manna before being renamed Post Toasties in 1908. The British government refused to allow Post to market his cereal in the United Kingdom using the name Elijah's Manna, stating that it was sacrilegious. In 1906, Post invested some of his substantial earnings from his food products manufacturing into Texas real estate, purchasing a massive tract in Garza and Lynn Counties. Post platted a new town, which he called Post City. Shade trees were planted, farm parcels laid out, and a hotel, a school, churches, and a department store were constructed for the new Garza County seat. Post was a staunch opponent of the trade union movement and was remembered by the National Association of Manufacturers as one who "opposed bitterly boycotts, strikes, lockouts, picketing and other forms of coercion in the relations between employer and employee". Post was also a leading public advocate of the open shop system.

At the end of 1913, the chronically ill Post's health deteriorated to the point that he canceled public appearances. In early March 1914, he was believed to be suffering from appendicitis, and was rushed via a nonstop train from California to the Mayo Clinic, in Rochester, Minnesota, to be operated on by Drs. William and Charles Mayo, who were regarded as the nation's preeminent surgeons at the time. The Mayo brothers operated successfully on Post sometime between March 5 and March 10, 1914, but Post's abdominal pain persisted, according to the book American Empress: The Life and Times of Marjorie Merriweather Post. Post then returned to his home in Santa Barbara, California with his stomach pain persisting. On May 9, 1914, despondent over his ongoing stomach illness and its symptoms, Post committed suicide with a self inflicted gunshot. He was 59 years old. Marjorie Merriweather Post later married financier E. F. Hutton and owned a estate on Long Island's North Shore called "Hillwood." Marjorie sold the estate in 1951 for $200,000 to Long Island University, which founded its residential C. W. Post College in 1954, marking the 100th anniversary of C. W. Post's birth. For a while named the C. W. Post Center and then the C. W. Post Campus, what was C. W. Post College has now become mainly a commuter campus called LIU/Post, and it has about 8,500 full and part time students and over 100,000 alumni. The World War II Liberty Ship, , was named in his honor.