Category Archives: Greater Midwest Foodways

Thoughts on the Origins of Pizzerias in America and Chicago

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Presented by Peter Regas
PizzaHistoryBook.com

View Presentation on Facebook and Youtube.

In the past, the historical consensus was the first licensed pizzeria in America was opened in 1905 at 53 Spring St. in New York City by a young Italian immigrant named Gennaro Lombardi. However, in 2019 at the U.S. Pizza Museum in Chicago, Peter Regas challenged that consensus with a talk titled “Filippo Milone and the Forgotten Pizza Makers of New York City.” Continue reading →

Sweet Greeks: First-Generation Immigrant Confectioners in the Heartland

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Presented by Ann Flesor Beck
Author and Candy Maker

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Gus Flesor came to the United States from Greece in 1901. His journey led him to Tuscola, Illinois, where he learned the confectioner’s trade and opened a business that still stands on Main Street. Sweet Greeks sets the story of Gus Flesor’s life as an immigrant in a small town within the larger history of Greek migration to the Midwest. Continue reading →

No Ketchup! Why Dennis Foley Ate 50 Hot Dogs in 50 Days

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Presented by Dennis Foley

View Presentation on Facebook and YouTube

“The basic Chicago dog has its own ingredients,” said Dennis Foley about the “Magnificent Seven” of mustard, onions, relish, tomatoes, pickle (or cucumber), sport peppers and celery salt that should top a dog with snap in a steamed bun. Continue reading →

When Potato Fields were Prisons: Unfree Farm Labor in McHenry County during World War II

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Presented Samuel Klee, Ph.D. candidate
(Program in conjunction with the Highland Park Historical Society)

View presentation on YouTube

During World War II, some farmers in Marengo, Illinois negotiated with a large food corporation and federal agencies to make local farm fields into restricted, prison-like spaces. When the Curtiss Candy Company brought Japanese-Americans from the Tule Lake Internment Camp in California to cultivate and pick potatoes in 1943, the Marengo community struggled with the federal government and the candy company to eliminate the outsiders’ presence.

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