Hibbing Candy Kitchen Virginia Candy Kitchen ORIGINS OF A DELICIOUS LEGACY: CANDY KITCHENS & THE CANELAKES' JOURNEY By Jim Froemming Published in The National Herald July 24, 2021   The National Herald has given HellenicGenealogyGeek.com permission to post articles that are of interest to our group --------------------------------------------  Starting around 1890, many Greeks, mainly single men, and many in their teens, left their villages in the Peloponnese region of Greece to find opportunity in America. They were poor farmers and shepherds, and America needed laborers at its railroads, mines, and mills for its growing economy. This is a story about four Greek brothers who came to America from the village of Sykea and decided to become confectioners (candy makers) instead.  The Canelake brothers came to America from a poor village in Greece as teenagers and soon became successful confectionery merchants on the Iron Range of Minnesota. They opened the Virg...

  Literary Review: 'SWEET GREEKS' HIGHLIGHTS IMMIGRANT CONFECTIONERS  IN THE MIDWEST USA Review by Eleni Sakellis published in The National Herald November 21, 2020 The National Herald has given HellenicGenealogyGeek.com permission to post articles that are of interest to our group. -------------------------------------------- While the Greek immigrant experience in the United States has long been associated with diners and the restaurant business, many Greeks went into candy-making. Many confectioners' shops were started by Greek immigrants in the 20th century, some of which are still operating as family-run businesses.  Sweet Greeks:  First-Generation Immigrant Confectioners in the Heartland by Ann Flesor Beck weaves together family memoir and the history of the Midwest in her book which highlights the Greek immigrant experience through her grandfather's story as a confectioner in Illinois.  The book was published in October by the University of Illinois Press...

  GREEK IMMIGRANTS AMERICAN DREAM IN OHIO by TNH Staff published in The National Herald August 8, 2020 The National Herald has given HellenicGenealogyGeek.com permission to post articles that are of interest to our group. -------------------------------------------- AKRON, OH – Greek immigrants Gus Kleines and John Petrou opened the Chocolate Shop in Akron on July 29, 1916, and as the Akron Beacon Journal (ABJ) reported, “it took moxie to open a chocolate shop on a 95-degree day in July.”  The shop was located at 4 South Howard Street near West Market Street with the Cretanborn Kleines as company president, Petrou, from Mandra outside Athens, as secretary and treasurer, while two other Greek immigrants, George Delis and Mike Lampos, served as vice presidents, ABJ reported.  “While the name might sound generic a century later, it was ahead of its time,” ABJ reported, noting that “such establishments were called candy stores and confectioneries before the businessmen i...

ORCHESTRION, GREEK CONFECTIONAIRES AND THE INTRO OF MECHANICAL MUSIC by Steve Frangos published in The National Herald July 25, 2020 The National Herald has given HellenicGenealogyGeek.com permission to post articles that are of interest to our group. -------------------------------------------- Even the most superficial of historical reviews clearly documents the role of Greek immigrants in the establishment and spread of popular entertainment forms across the Western Hemisphere. Public entertainment venues owned and operated by Greeks span just about every entertainment form in the history of the United States ranging across midways, carnivals, circuses, nickelodeons, vaudeville theaters, movie theaters, dance halls, dime-a-dance halls, hay rides, ice skate/roller skate rinks, jazz dance clubs like the Green Mill – said to be the oldest continuously open jazz club in America – bars/saloons/lounges in remote areas of the country that furnished weekend dance bands, the grand Aragon and...

CANDY JIM'S PALACE OF SWEETS by Steve Frangos Published in The National Herald - August 17, 2019 ------------------------------ I am excited that  The National Herald  has given Hellenic Genealogy Geek the right to reprint articles that may be of interest to our group.  ------------------------------ CHICAGO - For fifty-six years, Candy Jim's Palace of Sweets was located at various locations along Taylor Texas' Main Street. When Candy Jim, a.k.a. James Arthur Athas retired in 1955, newspapers from New York, Indiana, Illinois, Washington, Wisconsin, Texas, and elsewhere carried the news of his retirement under the headline, Sweet Success. Athas should be remembered not only as the much beloved small town Greek immigrant candyman but also for bringing the latest in developing cultural art forms to his rural Texas community. Candy Jim Athas is nothing less than one of the very first pioneering movie theater proprietors in North America.  ...

THE PIONEERS OF CONFECTION IN AMERICA By Steve Frangos Published in The National Herald, February 21, 2004 ------------------------------ I am excited that  The National Herald  has given Hellenic Genealogy Geek the right to reprint articles that may be of interest to our group.  ------------------------------ Few Greeks today realize that from the early 1870s until just after World War II, their compatriots held a commanding presence in the American confectionary industry, dishing up tons of sinfully sweet treats from behind the counters of their candy stores and ice cream parlors.   In fact, the Greeks’ early presence in this trade can be documented from a wide variety of sources. As Theodore Saloutos relates in his book, “The Greeks in the United States,” the pioneer confectioners were Eleutherios Pelalas of Sparta and Panagiotis Hatzideris of Smyrna, who established a lukum (sweet) shop shortly after their arrival in 1869. ...

Greek Star  --  April 01, 1904 The Greek Confectioners Chicago the Mecca of the Candy Business p. 2- Practically every busy corner in Chicago is occupied by a Greek candy store. Their perfect cleanliness and their elaborate method of making pure and delicious candies have made the Greeks the predominant factor in that line of business. An impartial investigation reveals the indisputable fact that the Greeks are the fathers of the present candy industry. What kind of candy store did we have here before the Greeks began to monopolize the trade? Where was candy sold, and what kind of candy? Old-timers know and remember where it was sold, and what kind of candy it was before the Greeks developed and expanded the manufacture and sale of confectionery. The Greek confectioners are Chicago's pride, and Chicago is the pride of two thirds of the country. Chicago, not New York, has the credit of being the city of candy-makers. Seventy per cent of the Greek candy-me...