Vernon S.P. Grant, who invented the Snap Crackle Pop elves for Kellogs, was quite a famous illustrator (please note the middle initials, so as to not confuse this with a famous Wisconsin artist of the same name)

These little booklets were distributed by stores, and this one below (Cow and Silver Cream)  has the printed address of Rudy's Meat Market in Portland Maine.

Grant was born on April 26, 1902, in Coleridge, Nebraska. When Grant was six years old, his family moved to South Dakota where they homesteaded.

 His experiences living on the prairies served as the inspiration for many of the artworks he would create throughout his career. While there he also learned illustration techniques from his beloved school teacher cousin Nellie Grant.

 As a teen, Grant moved with his family to California. He studied business law and public speaking at the University of Southern California and, at age 21, enrolled in the Art Institute of Chicago.


Vernon Grant was an illustrator best known for his creation of the SNAP! CRACKLE! AND POP! characters for Kellogg's and his whimsical magazine covers for "Collier's", "Ladies Home Journal", and many others. He is only 2nd to Norman Rockwell in the amount of published works

In 1933 he approached the Kellogg’s® ad agency with a clever idea for selling Rice Krispies® cereal.  Grant’s idea was to appeal to children who could greatly influence their parents’ buying habits. After receiving inspiration from the Singing Lady’s Rice Krispies radio jingle which had a snap, crackle and pop noise in the background, he drew three gnomes, naming them “Mr. Snap,” “Mr. Crackle, and “Mr. Pop.”

Kellogg’s ad agency, N.W. Ayer, put Grant on an immediate retainer of $5000. The Kellogg Company used Grant’s talents through 1941 and paid him close to a quarter of a million dollars. Although modified from Grant’s original images, Snap!® Crackle! ® and Pop! ® are still used today and are among the most famous images in American advertising.

He soon became the lead illustrator for Kellogg's products, becoming so popular that in 1935 the company sent him on a world tour to promote their cereals.

In 1938, Life magazine ranked Grant as "America's favorite children's artist."

Grant worked with the USO during World War II, entertaining troops with sketches and fast-paced chalk talks.

Grant’s illustrations appeared in print on the covers of national magazines, advertising products, greeting cards and children’s books from the 1920s through the 1970s

When Vernon Grant moved to Rock Hill in 1947 from New York he brought many progressive ideas to this community and region, accepted the position as manager of Rock Hill’s Chamber of Commerce, and  helped to lay the ground work for York Technical College

He co-founded Rock Hill, South Carolina's annual spring festival, Come-See-Me, and created it's mascot, Glen the Frog. http://www.comeseeme.org

ChristmasVille, a holiday festival in Rock Hill, celebrates the magical art of Vernon Grant with festive holiday decorations, santas, and gnomes. http://www.ChristmasVilleRockHill.com

In 1945, at the height of his career, Vernon Grant made $1000 a week illustrating ads for everything under the sun from cereal to automobiles, from chocolates to razor blades, from men’s shirts to electrical appliances. His gnomes, pretty, sexy-looking girls and love-struck couples were on the fronts of America’s top magazines.


Grant continued making art until, in 1985, he felt he could no longer work to his own expectations and was forced to retire. When he died in 1990 at age 88, the Charlotte Observer noted that although Grant's illustrations would delight people for years, "in the long run his greatest gift to the community may be the standard of citizenship he exemplified." As was not uncommon in that greatest of generations that got the world through WW2



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vernon_Simeon_Plemion_Grant
http://www.vernongrant.org/as-illustrator.html
http://poulwebb.blogspot.com/2019/03/colliers-magazine-part-13.html
https://www.pinterest.com/bkittlecreative/vernon-grant/?lp=true
http://oldchildrensbooks.com/books/the-cow-and-the-silver-cream-19401