dismemberment

animal cookies: 1890s, england

source

originally, the "british animal crackers came in only a handful of shapes, the american menagerie boasted a circus of seventeen different creatures (though the cookie came in eighteen distinct shapes): bison, camel, cougar, elephant, giraffe, gorilla, hippopotamus, hyena, kangaroo, lion, monkey, rhinoceros, seal, sheep, tiger, zebra, and sitting bear. the eighteenth shape was a walking bear.

"although a box of animal crackers contained twenty-two cookies, no child... was guaranteed a full representation of a zoo... the randomness added an element of expectancy to a gift box of animal crackers, a plus the company had not foreseen. and soon parents were writing to nabisco and revealing another unanticipated phenomenon (either trivial or of deep psychological import): children across american nibbled away at the animals in a definite order of dismemberment: back legs, forelegs, head, and lastly the body."

i totally ate my cookies the same way. creepy!

from charles panati's extraordinary origins of everyday things