Help wanted: Kapaun Museum in need of volunteers

By MINDY KEPFIELD

Staff writer

The phone at the Father Kapaun Museum has been ringing nonstop with requests for tours.

The calls are pouring in from so many cities museum guide Harriet Bina can barely keep track.

She just knows they are desperately short-handed and in need of volunteers.

“Right now we are fighting to keep our heads above water,” she said.

There are only four tour guides the museum, one of whom has a job elsewhere.

“I have been doing a heck of a lot of tours and they have been helping when they can,” she said.

Now that father Kapaun’s remains have been found, a growing number of people have become interested in the town where he grew up.

“They want to know the community that made him the man he was,” Bina said.

Groups have started booking again and many people have begun showing up in unannounced and joining visitors whenever they can.

Bina did an hour-long talk with 17 seminarians from Newman University this past week, several other church groups and two families who homeschooled their children.

The problem is exhilarating and exhausting, but she still is grateful for the interest in the Pilsen priest who has been decared a Servant of God.

“I will never get tired of telling the story of Father Kapaun,” she said.

The Father Kapaun Museum is open from 1 to 4 p.m. Tuesdays and Fridays.

Groups are strongly encouraged to notify Harriet Bina at (620) 381-1689 even if they plan to visit during operating hours.