Anton Frank in Front of Original Grocery Store
on Tobacnoir Street 1908
Special Birthday Feature
Happy Birthday Suzanne
The Frank Compound
Kaukauna, Wisconsin
The Frank Family Compound started in 1888 when Peter Frank and his family moved from Sherwood, Wisconsin to Kaukauna, Wisconsin and he and his son John purchased the grocery store on Tobacnoir Street. They not only owned and operated the store until 1907, but bought a family home around the corner at 806 Oviate Street.
In 1908 Peter Frank moved to Shawano, Wisconsin and sold his co-ownership to his son Anton Harold Frank. Anton Frank is pictured in front of the store in that year. Then Anton Frank also purchased the house on Oviate St. from his brother and father. Anton, his wife Dorothea, and their children, Emmet, Orville, Harold, Geneafava, Elaine, and Dorothy May moved into the house.
Original Store on Tobacinoir Street Converted to Apartment Building
In 1926 a red brick grocery store was built on the corner of Tobacnoir Street and Oviate Street. The symbol on the second floor above the front doors states the 1926 date. On the ground at the front doors was the name "Frank" in mosaic tiles. The original red brick store had two large front store window and the check out counter was in the center. In 1930 when his father Anton Frank died, Harold Frank became the store manager. He ran the store for his mother Dorothea Frank until she died in 1968 and the store was sold. By 1994 the building housed a laundomat.
1926 Grocery Store On Corner of Tobacnoir and Oviate Streets
The Frank family home originally had brown siding. There was a large glassed in porch all the way across the front of the first floor and a porch on the second floor. The back of the house was also a glassed in porch. Inside on the first floor of the house was a living room on the right, a dining room on the left and behind it a kitchen and small bedroom. In these rooms is where Orville Frank and Hazel Juergenmeyer (Suzanne (Frank) Wilson's parents) were married. Between the living room and the dining room was a large center stairway with an open railing on the livingroom side. Other bedrooms were upstairs. After Anton died, his wife Dorothea (Suzanne (Frank) Wilson's grandmother) "took to her chair". A lift was installed on the center stairway and from then on she greeted her grandchildren and twisted colored foil onto wheat seeds on stalks to make bouquets from a chair next to a table in the living room.
Frank Family Home at 806 Oviate Street
The large flower garden between the 1926 red brick store and the family home completed the compound.
(Frank) Wilson 1908 in front of first Frank Grocery Store on the
100 block of Tobacnoir Street in Kaukauna, Wisconsin.
2nd-Store from 1908 now turned into a building with apartments.
Sold in 1968. Photo taken in 2006 by SW.
3rd-1926 Frank Grocery Store. Sold in 1968. Photo taken in
2006 by SW.
Bottom-Frank family home at 806 Oviate Street. Sold in 1968.
Photo taken in 2006 by SW.
Note: Suzanne(Frank) Wilson is the daughter of Orville Carlton Frank, the
granddaughter of Anton Harold Frank, and the great granddaughter of
Peter Frank.
Thank You: To Karen (Frank) Hull for family history information.
