Sugar Krinkles

"More fun than a circus!" footnote exclaimed Post about its Sugar Krinkles, a sugar-coated, puffed rice cereal introduced in 1950. This box comes from 1953, when Post ran a promotion giving away a free full-sized package of Charms candy in each box. You can see a corresponding newspaper ad here. 

The cereal packaging also prominently features the cereal's mascot, Krinkles the Clown; in the same year this box would have been on grocery store shelves, competitor Kellogg's was also using a clown to promote its own similar cereal, Sugar Smacks. See an ad here, at your own peril. Supposedly these clown mascots were enjoyed by children.

In the 1960s, the cereal would cycle through a few names (Sugar Rice Krinkles, Rice Krinkles, Frosted Rice Krinkles) and receive a new mascot, a racist caricature of a rice-loving Chinese boy, before discontinuation in the 1970s.