Quality Fresh & Smoked Meats
PENNSYLVANIA DUTCH SPECIALTIES
Founders
Willard Forrest Dietrich was born and raised in a Pennsylvania German farm family in Albany Township, northern Berks County, Pennsylvania and attended a one-room schoolhouse. Originally a gristmill farm, he proudly lived his entire life on the same farm as three generations before him. Throughout his life, he modestly expanded the acreage and modernized with the agricultural industry. He bought the farm’s first baler – a New Holland 77 baler with a Wisconsin engine, built four Star silos, expanded the main barn, and installed a grain storage facility. To Willard, the perfect day was an average day on his farm. That’s where he spent the morning, on a tractor mowing wheat stubbles, before he unexpectedly left this earth at the age of 73 in August, 2001.
Verna Emma (Leiby) Dietrich grew up in a Pennsylvania German farm family along the Windsor and Perry Township line, near the village of Virginville, Berks County, Pennsylvania. She attended high school, but opted not to complete, instead taking a job at an undergarment factory in the nearby borough of Hamburg, Pennsylvania. After marrying Willard, she took on the task of farmer’s wife, focused on her love of food and tradition, while discovering her natural ability of sales. When she opened the butcher shop and country store in 1975, she was a determined 44-year-old-woman who believed in her own intuition and family’s ability. She took a chance, never looked back, and unbeknownst to her at the time, was about to embark on a journey that would become her life’s legacy. She would continue to be that driving force behind the success of her family’s business for the rest of her life. Verna continued to greet customers daily at the store, doing so the morning of her passing at the age of 93 in August, 2024.