The general store is a recreation of an actual store owned and operated by the family of MOAH board member Ken Kormanak. Most of the equipment in this exhibit, including a sausage stuffer, coffee grinder, cheese slicer and grape crusher came from an actual grocery store owned by Helena and Jozef Kormanak in a South Side neighborhood of Chicago. Fresh and smoked Polish sausage was made on the premesis, as well as cold cured dill pickles. They also sold canned goods, soaps, plug tobacco and grains -- all in a store 20 by 32 feet.

The butcher's block beneath the scale had to be cleaned each night, first sprinkled with salt to draw out the fat, and then scraped with a wire brush. This process wore the block down unevenly, and it had to be periodically re-leveled with a band saw by a commercial service. Eventually, the block would be so worn down that it had to be replaced.

Sausage making was a family affair, with Jozef grinding the meat and mixing it with spices, grandson Ken cranking the handle of the sausage stuffer and his mother tieing off the links. Fresh sausage was refrigerated, with a portion set aside to be hickory fire smoked in a concrete smokehouse behind the store.

Across the store behind the counter are displayed a wide variety of packaged goods. The counter also bears a large red coffee grinder and the manually operated cash register. No credit card reader here!

A corner of the store is occupied by a candy counter, provided by Sees and stocked with pre WWII goodies. There are a few wartime items displayed, also. Along the wall, shelves contain many of the canned items that would have been sold in the store. Visit, and see how many you can recall. Now, more than seventy years after opening day, people are still coming to the store. Jozef and Helena Kormanak would be amazed!

This page last updated: February 13, 2001