By MICHAEL F. DWYER
On a perfect-weather Saturday in June, over 400 people gathered at the Village Farm in Pittsford to celebrate the life of Joseph John “Joe” Kamuda (1952–2025). The festivities not only honored Joe’s service to the community, it was also an homage to the three generations of Kamudas who have operated a market at the heart of the village since 1939. Joe and his wife Laurie took over the business in 1985 from his parents, Joseph S. and Josephine (Orzel) Kamuda. In turn, Brian Kamuda has now succeeded his parents in the business. There is, however, a less-remembered story of the grocery patriarch, John [Jan] Kamuda (1882–1967), the grandfather of Joseph J. Kamuda and John H. Brutkoski.
Unlike many immigrants whose precise origins get lost, Jan Kamuda left abundant clues about his home village, Mielec, then in the Austrian district of Poland. Catholic Church records reveal that Jan, born on January 30, 1882, was the eighth of nine children of Philip and Anna (Ortil) Kamuda. At least two preceding generations of the family lived in Mielic. One still finds Kamuda family members living in this charming market town today, once the locus of fierce opposition to Soviet domination during the Cold War.
A tantalizing clue to Jan’s early life comes through a framed studio portrait, displayed with pride of place in the Kamuda/Brutkoski home, of him in a dashing Austrian army uniform. Army conscription was mandatory for men over the age of 21, and in the early years of the 20th century, when Austria was not yet at war, his term of service would have lasted three years. The end of his time in uniform coincides with his departure to the United States. He sailed aboard the Batavia out of Hamburg and arrived in New York on 24 April 1906, final destination West Rutland. Thereafter, his life in Vermont diverged from the typical Polish immigrant who labored for the Vermont Marble Company.
The 1910 census for Pittsford lists John Comoda as a grocer boarding with the Constantin Tyminski family on Fire Hill Road in Florence. At the age of 32, he married fellow immigrant Anna Moskał, age 31, their marriage recorded in Pittsford with Rev. Max Gannas officiating. This fact puzzled me on two counts: I would have expected them to have been married by Rev. Valentin Michulka at St. Stanislaus in West Rutland. A Polish-born protégé of Father Michulka, Gannas worked as the choir master and teacher at St. Stanislaus before completing his seminary studies for the priesthood. In 1914, he completed his seminary studies and filled in for Michulka while the latter returned to Poland for an extended visit. For many years, priests of St. Stanislaus said a Mass every month for the Polish residents of Florence who may not have been able to get to West Rutland with ease.
Anna Moskał, born in the village of Korczyna, about fifty miles south of Mielec, came to the United States in 1903. Her whereabouts prior to her marriage have not been ascertained. All eight children of John and Anna had their baptisms recorded at St. Stanislaus between 1915 and 1924. Second son Stanislaw later anglicized his first name to Stephen. One usually anticipates finding clues to other family relationships in the names of the baptismal godparents. None, however, were named Kamuda. Martin Markowski served as godfather to the first two children, with Rosalia Moskał as godmother to Stanislaw. How and if they were related has not been ascertained. John Kamuda had one younger brother, Matthew Kamuda, who emigrated to Buffalo. A cousin from Mielec, Joseph Kamuda worked for many years for the Vermont Marble Company, but he does not appear to have a close connection to John and Anna.
As his family grew, John and Anna managed two grocery businesses. Sonny Poremski shared this recollection from his mother, nee Stella Markowski, born in 1920. “There was a Kamuda’s store on the right hand side of Whipple Hollow Road which would have been between the third and fourth house (which was Charlie Fay’s and is the last house now, before Liz Willis’s farm) from the second set of railroad tracks past OMYA but that house was torn down and Stella said that Kamuda’s also had a store at one point on the left hand side just before you turn into OMYA now.”
Prohibition laws ensnared the family when an undercover agent purchased gallons of bootleg liquor at the Whipple Hollow Store. What made headlines though is that Anna Kamuda attempted to take the rap for her husband. This article from the January 16, 1925 issue of The Rutland Herald conveys how the story became sensationalized.
“In spite of the fact that his wife Anna, who is the mother of eight children, attempted to take the blame on her own shoulders for the sake of five gallons of alcohol made at their store in Florence, Vermont, John Kamuda, was found guilty in Rutland County Court yesterday of selling intoxicating liquor…Mrs. Kamuda told the jury that is was she and not her husband who made the sale.” It continued, “Husband ‘Works for Wife.’ Mrs. Kamuda told the jury that it was she who operated a grocery store at Florence; it was she who bargained with [agent] Thompson for the sale of alcohol; it was she who bought the alcohol in the first place; it was she who was head of the household. Her husband worked for her for his board and was content in this arrangement the woman testified. Confronted with the question as to why she had so much alcohol about the premises Mrs. Kamuda testified that she used it for bathing purposes…State’s attorney Charles E. Novak, who prosecuted, argued that Kamuda was the head of the family and was responsible for the acts of the household. He believed the jury would not permit a man to hide behind a woman’s skirts, he said.”
John Kamuda’s guilty verdict negated his naturalization application, for the time being. He had taken out papers earlier. Anna once again took up the mantle and became a United States citizen in her own right in 1933. A photo accompanied her file as well as a personal description that she was 5’ 7” and weighed 170 pounds. John found another way to apply for citizenship a second time. Using his native name as Jan Kamuda and changing his birthplace, Miliec, to Zlotniki, Poland, in fact his last residence before coming to America, he obfuscated his earlier brush with the law and successfully became a citizen in 1934.
By 1930, the Kamudas acquired a second property at 8 East Street in Proctor. John and eldest son Joe were listed as grocers in Florence, while Anna and the other seven children are listed in Proctor at another grocery business. The World War II years had a significant impact on the family. In 1943, The Rutland Herald reported that son Frank Kamuda won a Purple Heart for meritorious service in North Africa, while his three brothers, Joe, Peter, Edward, and son-in-law Herman Brutkoski also served in the army.
While her husband Joe Kamuda was away in the service for four years, Josephine Kamuda ran the Pittsford Market with the help of her brother. In 1948, with Joe’s return, they made a significant change to the store’s operation from a customer going in with a list while the grocer obtained the provisions to what we are accustomed to today as a supermarket with self-service. Meanwhile, continuing to live over their Proctor market, John and Anna Kamuda worked 100-hour weeks as reported in the 1950 census. Following Anna’s death in 1956, John slipped into gradual retirement after 46 years in the grocery business.
John Kamuda died in 1967 after a long period of declining health. Three of his children still lived in Vermont: Joe, over the store in Pittsford; Steve, over his store in Proctor; Mary Brutkoski in Brandon. The others left the area: Frank had moved to Troy, New York; Eddie to New Hampshire; Frances Doermer to Mamaroneck, New York; Peter to New Smyrna Beach, Florida, and Amelia, a career telephone operator and owner of an apartment building in Los Angeles.
From an ambitious immigrant, Jan Kamuda, arriving at Ellis Island in 1906 to his great-grandson Brian continuing to manage a thriving grocery and catering business, this family can look back on more than a century of long hours and major changes in this service industry. My take on their institutional longevity? Always going the extra mile for the customer!
Acknowledgements: The Brutkoski family, Olivia Boughton, Brian and Jeff Kamuda [former students, of course!], Sonny Poremski, Frederick Stachura, and Tracey Snow.
