by BRIAN NADIG
The first “Taste of Polonia” festival at Jefferson Park’s Copernicus Center was a far cry from the multiple entertainment venues and wide array of food options that now draw 30,000 to 40,000 visitors annually to the capital event of Labor Day week.
“It was a fundraiser, and it was basically a band, tabs … a Polish restaurant and no stage, just a climb,” Copernicus Foundation President Hubert Cioromski said of the first Taste of Polonia on 1980
Today, the festival draws people from “a 20-state radius. People come and make a weekend of it” in Chicago, Cioromski said.
The foundation will host its 40th Taste of Poland from September 2 to 5. It had planned to celebrate the 40th anniversary in 2020, but the pandemic caused the cancellation of the festival two years in a row.
The foundation, which was founded 51 years ago, purchased the former Gateway movie theater at 5216 W. Lawrence Ave. at the end of the seventies and turned it into a cultural and performing arts complex, where the festival is held every year.
Initial plans had called for a restaurant and banquet service to be part of the complex, but the foundation ultimately focused its efforts on preserving the 1,900-seat auditorium, which was built in 1930 and features an atmospheric ceiling.
Elvis Costello, Yes, Kansas are among some of the most famous rock artists to have performed there in addition to cultural shows that reflect the diversity of Chicago itself, Cioromski said. He added that the festival continues to be an important element of the foundation’s fundraising efforts, which support building maintenance and management and the foundation’s charitable efforts.
The festival has attracted former U.S. presidents Barack Obama, when he was a U.S. senator, and George HW Bush, when he was the sitting president.Cioromski said a communications center was set up in an adjacent building in case of ‘national emergency while Bush was. at the festival, and not far away there was a helicopter waiting in case the president had a medical problem.
“Every (Illinois) governor has been here,” Cioromski said.
This year’s festival will feature four stages, featuring rock, pop, dance music, classical and, of course, polka. Rock tributes to R.EM., Led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd and Chicago are among the scheduled entertainment.
There will also be bounce houses, face painting, Disney characters, tasting and cooking classes, carnival rides and games, more than 30 vendors, cultural exhibits, movies and a casino.
And what has become a regular in recent years, the 15-member Gentlemen of Leisure Band and Review will perform on Labor Day, performing Motown, Top 40, hip-hop and a wide variety of popular music. Taste of Polonia is the only festival the band plays, as it does weddings and other private events, but it always draws a big crowd to the Taste, Cioromiski said.
For more information about the festival, visit www.topchicago.org
