Likely lured by the prospect of economic opportunity, young Thomas Stoysich boarded a train with just a box of food in 1910. That train ride was the first leg in a journey that would take him to Ellis Island before arriving in Omaha. Born in Budapest, Hungary in 1894, Thomas didn’t know a lick of English when he arrived, but he was a fast learner and a hard worker.
Once he arrived in town, he lived at a boarding house that was owned by his future father-in-law. It was there that he first met his wife, Elizabeth Kollar, in 1911. They would go back-and-forth between Minnesota, where her parents had a farm, and Nebraska before finally getting married in Omaha in 1918.
Tom had a dream of starting his own business but hadn’t gotten the opportunity thus far. Instead, he worked in the packing plants where he got his big break after taking over sausage making duties. For the next 33 years, he would learn the secrets of the trade. It wasn’t until after he lost his job that he would realize his dream. In 1949 he bought a small store at 5170 Q St. He moved his family into the second-floor apartment of what had been White’s Red & White grocery store. From the shop he would sell smoked and ground meats with the help of his youngest son Frank. He would become well known in South Omaha for his sausage. Tom would go on to retire in 1960 at the age of 64.
Tom didn’t know it at the time, but his sons would end up becoming the Sausage Kings of Omaha. Upon his retirement, Tom sold his business to Frank. It seems that the elder Rudy was a bit more reluctant to get into the sausage trade. He had first considered purchasing a bar and liquor store. Frank would rebrand his father’s store as Frank Stoysich Meats in 1960. Just one year later, Rudy followed his younger brother’s lead when he opened Stoysich House of Sausage in 1961. Located at 2532 S 24th St, the building had been the home to Herek’s Food Store.
With its unique color scheme, you can’t miss the large stucco building that sits at the corner of 24th and Bancroft. While the home of Stoysich House of Sausage started much smaller, it expanded over time eventually taking over an adjoining shoe repair store, barbershop and auto repair business. It’s much easier to miss Frank Stoysich Meats. Built in 1987, the modern brick building was only built after a fire damaged the old building where Tom started the family business decades earlier.
By the time Tom passed away in 1983, his sons had developed reputations as top-notch butchers and sausage makers themselves. With two sons operating two stores with similar names and selling similar products, customers would often get them confused. That would occasionally lead to a customer ordering at one store only to end up mistakenly going to another store for pickup. Of course, they also developed a friendly rivalry over the years. They would often compete against one another in competitions. Both would go onto win awards for both sausage and ham over the years.
While Frank passed away in 2011 and Rudy in 2014, both of their businesses remain family owned. Today the Stoysich surname is synonymous for sausage throughout Omaha and in some cases, the world.
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