Greater Beloit is recognized as the food processing center of the Midwest. The man who started it all by his serendipitous invention in 1931 was Clair B. Mathews, herdsman for the Dougan Guernsey Farm on the southern edge of Beloit’s east side. He made a discovery that was revolutionary in food production.

Associated with Mr. Mathews in the development of the new machine were Clarence Schwebke, the machinist who helped put the “crazy idea” together, Earl Berry, consulting engineer and H.W. Adams, lawyer.

Mathews was searching for a way to grind grains so that they might be more completely digested by dairy cattle. He filed and fitted wagon hub parts in such a way that when grain was turned out in “coffee mill” fashion, flakes came out of the tin spout. That was in 1931 and since then many improvements have been made on the original device.

Grains of all kinds have gone through the machine with amazing results. Variations have been developed from a finely-ground powder to a large “puffed” flake, five inches or more across. The process has offered food possibilities for man, beast and fish.

Many feed mixtures and combinations are treated in this machine. A food, quite complete in nutritional value was produced. Sugar, salt, skim milk, powder, chocolate, linseed meal, cod liver oil, etc., have been sprinkled on the whole grain and merged into the flakes improving flavor and color as well as nutritives and vitamins.

Corn, rice, wheat, oats (hulled and un-hulled), barley, rye, soybeans, alfalfa meal, bran and gluten have been put into the “flaking machine,” both separately and in combination and have come out in surprising bulk, shape and taste.

On December 6, 1933, Mathews, Berry and Adams formed Flakall Corporation and the process was patented in 1938. When only corn was used in the machine, the resulting extruded product puffed up as it hit the air. A retired Navy man, Edward Wilson, scooped up some of the puffy corn extrusions and took them home. He fried them in deep fat, salted them and found them to be delicious. He dubbed the discovery “Korn Kurls” and thus the snack food industry, dominated by potato chips, was revolutionized.