The National Bread Museum of Grain-Baking-Bread Culture
Our Mission with You
has multiple programs,
but is first a tribute to home baking & to all who've helped make that happen
by Preserving our Heritage of Ag/Grain - Milling - Flour - Bread/Baking
through the Preservation of Historical Artifacts (mostly late 1800s through the 1900s),
and by Providing Education and Enrichment through the
National Bread Museum (of Bread Culture Artifacts) & Study Center
The Baking Mill - hands in the dough
Stone Oven Bakery; Harvest Table Eatery
Library & Bread Culture Archive
Tins of Taste Museum & Art-on-Tin Study Center
Cultural Heritage Center & Immigration Museum - What is your neighbor baking?~ Our Ancestral Tribute & Honor Archive ~
Grandma's life of heart & home was her legacy. She's woven in our past.
Giving Thanks for God's Great Grains & Grandma's Goodness.
WHY do we need this?
Museums expand our knowledge & are proof
of history.
The National Bread Museum of
Grain-Baking-Bread Culture especially recognizes & validates Grandma and her way of life w/her family in the Heart of the Home,
particularly during the 1900s.
Grains were one of the first three foundational elements (w/fishing & hunting), & still continue to be exceptionally significant to the growth of our country by sustaining people & giving rise to multitudes of related businesses, companies, & industries through the centuries . . . and specifically because of the role that home baking played in creating their successes!! It is vital that we bestow recognition on grandmothers who were vital in this endeavor & preserve the memory of their lives, their work, & their creative (yummy!) results in connection with the bounty of this land.
* * * * *
This National Bread Museum of Grain-Baking-Bread Culture (currently online only) is to be a legacy by & representing all the people of the United States of America, . . . rising up from the Omaha, Nebraska, area . . . which is central to the Breadbasket of North America; in the Heart of the Midwest Grain Belt; & at the central crossroads of the country and Great Plains region.
* NOTE: We're currently in the process of building the National Bread Museum of Grain-Baking-Bread Culture & its programs on this website in order to present the vision and goals to you, while also providing the value of historical and educational information. Also, the museum does not exist "on land" at this time. There are around 90 "bread culture affiliated" museums around the world, but none in this country of this extent, to recognize the vast scope of "bread culture: ag/grain-milling-flour-bread/baking" especially in relationship to home baking. Some of us would like to change that, but we'll need your help and the support of the bread culture community throughout this country (United States of America), to raise the funds. (If you enjoy eating cereal, a sandwich - a cookie - cake - or a doughnut, plus pasta, pizza, and rice, you're one of the bread culture community!) Please consider giving a donation asap, & encourage others, to help make this happen.
Thank You! --- Donna Kozak, Founder
Newest Page Addition - "Cookbook Culture, Part I" - under (4) Library & Ephemera (11-10-2023)
Raising the Dough - - - Sharing Your Roots
PULLING TOGETHER TO PRESERVE
your mom's, grandma's, & past great/great-great- (& more) grandmothers' names, towns, & eras in which they
contributed through baking to raise a family and build this country which benefits us today.
They impacted lives & created a valuable baking foundation for
our families, communities, and to develop this country's American culture.
Together we need to create our country's (nonprofit - an already established corporation)
National Bread Museum of Grain-Baking-Bread Culture as an on-land facility.
Honor Mom, Grandma, or another as "one in a million" with a TRIBUTE to her Bread Culture-connected life.
Let us not forget out valued ancestors! Help create our "Heart of the Home" ancestral archive.
Tools of the Trade of hands & hearts . . .
Your Grandmother baked - - - trust us! Grains are a major part of life.
We owe a debt of gratitude to remember & preserve the home baking history of our family and others before them, & the "art of design" of the tools which are cultural curiosities to today's young!
We support the mission that no one goes hungry in this country - - - Does your neighbor have a loaf of bread or bag of flour each day?
The Vision Is On A Roll!
Grains have existed since the beginning of time. Our ancestors lived their
lives in the fields, mills, and kitchens in the name of Bread Culture.
Lest we forget, it's up to us to record - preserve - honor their lives
by name-hometown-era-heritage, & recipes/photographs.
Grain growers & bountiful bakers have created part of this country's
national & historical identity via our grains & baking.
Baking has kept generational family ties together.
Our baking voice represents
celebration - custom - ritual - pageantry - legend - narrative - tradition
and ties that bind. This is "our" stake in "our" history. Let's guard it so as to not
forget - let's preserve to carry forth the family histories of our
Bread Culture Ancestry and Immigrant Heritage of the past for the future.
Europe's Bread Museums - Where it all began - 1955
Today there are at least 90+ Bread-Culture-Related "Bread Museums" world-wide, but we have none in the USA to span our Bread Culture scope as those around the world do. This website is the preview of the plan for an "on the land" museum to fill that gap!
The springboard for establishing The National Bread Museum for American Bread Culture is Europe's Bread Museums. It's the perfect model for our country's historic preservation, education, and ancestral tribute of our Ag/Grain-Milling-Flour-Bread/Baking culture.
See the National Bread Museum on Facebook for an album of 49-photos of some of the Bread Museums in Europe. (Scroll down to the 10-16-2019 post.)
The European resource for these museums is ATLAS - Bread Museums in Europe & Beyond - a resource guide book. See below.
As the NBM Founder, the "bread museum" knowledge began with the book, The Book of Bread by Jerome Assire, 1996, with an index of bread museums for my 1st trip to see 3-4. Then later I used the museum database by Dimitrije Vujadinovic on breadculture.net (copy & paste).
Even though the National Bread Museum of Grain-Baking-Bread Culture is still an "on line" museum as of now, it has gained international recognition! It is listed in the ATLAS - Bread Museums in Europe & Beyond representing the USA, out of 90+ bread-related museums in other countries world wide! The book is a free download at breadculture.net (copy & paste or type it into a search bar as the "link" doesn't work to get you there). Click on Bread Publications in the website's left menu. The NBM listing is on page 92.
The Mission
From Tiller to Table * Field to Flour * Baker to Bread * Touching Every Soul
1) Preserving our heritage of Ag/Grain, Milling, Flour, Bread/Baking so we do not forget who grew the grain, tilled & milled, and baked our bread. The mill grew the community . . . then the state. Do you know that in the late 1800s there had been up to 300+ flour mills in Nebraska alone? What's the history of flour mills in your state? (one resource is: spoom.org/ Society for the Preservation of Old Mills)
2) Be concerned stewards of Bread Culture history by the preservation of historical artifacts, ephemera, related thematic bygones-of-yesteryear, & associated knowledge of our grandmother's way of life (we're primarily documenting 1850-1999), so we never forget her legacy. How many generations of your grandmothers will you be able to archive to give each a tribute?
3) Provide programs & baking training for the educational benefit, enrichment, fulfillment, and healthy welfare of all people. While we can, let's glean home baking history & recipes from "Grandma's" baking generation (especially prior to the 1970s, and from original immigrants & refugees), & preserve & share the best they gave us. This project is our tribute & thanks to our ancestral grandmothers.
4) Find, preserve, and repurpose an old building in (1st choice) the Omaha, Nebraska, area to house the National Bread Museum for the United States, as our Bread Culture affects everyone's family history. Omaha is on the main, central crossroads of the country, in the Midwest Grain Belt, & central to the Breadbasket of North America. The Sower is even on the top of Nebraska's State Capitol.
Supporting the vision for the National Bread Museum's
9 thematic components
(1) National Bread Museum (Bread Culture Artifacts) & Study Center
An insight into the historical grain-related artifacts which hold the life stories of our fathers "working the land" as sowers and tillers, reapers and millers. We have become . . . . .
(2) The Baking Mill where everyone can get their hands in the dough
(3) The Stone Oven Bakery and Harvest Table Eatery
The "Hole-in-the-Wall" oven is a tradition to behold! It's a "Step Back in Time of Living History," usually associated with what's considered "The Old World." What an experience!
(5) Tins of Taste Museum & Art-on-Tin Study Center
. . . collecting art - advertising & graphics - history - German Lebkuchen tins - British biscuit tins (how it all began in the 1800s) - "tins" for cookies, crackers, candy, tea, cakes, coffee, oatmeal, hot chocolate, and more . . .
(6) Cultural Heritage Center and Immigration Museum
Everyone in this country has ROOTS from another land -- another part of the world. Most of us aren't OF other lands, but we can TRACE our lineage IF our family before us kept logging . . .
(7) A Glimpse into the Past ~ Why it's Incumbent upon Us to Give Tribute & Honor with a Thankful Heart & Soul
LIFE SHOULD BE LIVED AS A TIDE OF THANKSGIVING
Can you trace your family roots back to your first ancestral immigrants? Every person should know of the "ties that bind." The schools no longer teach cursive, nor include a Family Tree in the . . .
