History
Various versions of unleavened dry crackers known as hardtack have been around for thousands of years. The generally thick hardtack cracker was extremely long lasting but not very tasty.
In 1876, F.L. Sommer & Company of St. Joseph, Missouri started using baking soda to leaven its wafer thin cracker. Initially called the Premium Soda Cracker and later "Saltines" because of the baking salt component, the invention quickly became popular and Sommer's business quadrupled within four years. That company merged with other companies to form American Biscuit Company in 1890 and then after further mergers became part of Nabisco in 1898.
In the United States, Nabisco lost trademark protection after the term began to be used generically to refer to similar crackers. The name "saltine" had been placed in the Merriam Webster Dictionary in 1907 with a definition of "a thin crisp cracker usually sprinkled with salt”. In Australia, Arnott's Biscuits Holdings still holds a trademark on the name "Saltine".
They were made in the United Kingdom by Huntley and Palmers, and also in Australia and New Zealand under the brand name Arnott's Salada.
Read more about this topic: Saltine Cracker
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