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Now that the grocery store chain Aldi has opened a Portland location on 1100 Brighton Ave., let’s turn back time to the 1930s and ’40s. That’s when neighborhoods depended on their local, independent grocers to keep cupboards and fridges stocked.

Here are photos of three neighborhood grocery stores that were essential to the communities they served.

Columbia Market at 101 Ocean St. in South Portland on July 3, 1939. The building is now home to Barber Brothers Meat & Provisions. (Portland Press Herald photo courtesy Portland Public Library Special Collections and Archives)
Children outside A.C. Crocker and Son grocery store on 1147 Forest Ave in Portland on Sept. 27, 1946. The store was along the eastern side of Forest Avenue, north of Morrill Street. (Portland Press Herald photo courtesy Portland Public Library Special Collections and Archives)
Stolkner Brothers Market at 363 Congress St. in Portland, at the northwest corner of Congress and Pearl streets, on April 6, 1949. The grocery was owned and operated by brothers Abraham Stolkner and Jacob Stolkner. (Portland Press Herald photo courtesy Portland Public Library Special Collections and Archives)

Aimsel Ponti is a music writer and content producer for the Portland Press Herald. She has been obsessed with – and inspired by – music since she listened to Monkees records borrowed from the town...

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