Lake E. High - A History of South Carolina Barbeque

Published by American Palate

A Division of The History Press

Charleston, SC 29403

www.historypress.net

Copyright 2013 by Lake E. High Jr.

All rights reserved

First published 2013

e-book edition 2013

Manufactured in the United States

ISBN 978.1.61423.976.5

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

High, Lake E., author.

A History of South Carolina Barbeque / Lake E. High Jr.

pages cm. -- (American Palate)

print edition ISBN 978-1-60949-863-4 (pbk.)

1. Barbecuing--South Carolina--History. I. Title.

TX840.B3H54 2013

641.76--dc23

2013032688

Notice: The information in this book is true and complete to the best of our knowledge. It is offered without guarantee on the part of the author or The History Press. The author and The History Press disclaim all liability in connection with the use of this book.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form whatsoever without prior written permission from the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews

CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The truth is, I did most of this work myself, and after a while, it got to be a chore, but (thank goodness) I did get some much-appreciated help along the way. First of all, thank you to my sweet wife, who is always so supportive and who never criticizes anything. She helped correct my manuscript and gave some good suggestions. Then there was Walter Rolandi, co-founder of the South Carolina Barbeque Association (SCBA), who freely criticized and gave me some remarkably valuable suggestions.

Debby Bloom at the Richland County Public Library is always helpful, as was the whole staff there. Then there was that nice ladywhose name I forgetat the Charleston County Library who kept lugging those heavy boxes out of some dusty back room so that I could work with original materials.

There was also Jackie Hite of Leesville, who is always a hoot to be with and who gave me much insight into barbeque history in his neck of the woods. Also in Leesville, Tommy Shealy of Shealys Barbeque let us look around and take photos and gave us some good history, as did Jerry Hite of Hites Barbeque in West Columbia. Pat Clough of Maurices, who is always so nice and such a pleasure to deal with, was also most helpful.

Ive also got to mention Chad Rhoad of The History Press, who listened and showed much patience while I stormed and cussed about the photographs and visuals. They must have hired him for his relentless good humor under fire.

There were a number of people that I talked to on the phone, almost all of whom contributed in some way. The beauty of barbeque is that if you want to talk about it, you can always get up a conversation on a moments notice. People love their barbeque.

And then there are the good folks in the SCBA whose photos and quotes were used. The SCBA is about having fun with the worlds best food, and the members are always in good humor, which makes for a very genial group of judges. Thanks to all.

INTRODUCTION

The film crew was from Modern Marvels, a show that airs on the History Channel, but the activity being filmed was far from modern. In fact, they had asked me to find them a barbeque restaurant where the barbeque was prepared the old-fashioned way. They wanted to show the evolution of that culinary art, and they specifically wanted a restaurant that still made its own charcoal.

We were at Jackie Hites barbeque restaurant in Leesville, and Jackie, the affable ex-mayor of Leesville and the longtime owner of one of South Carolinas legendary barbeque restaurants, was waxing eloquently about the origin of barbeque. Jackie was in front of his hand-built furnace, in which he burns down hickory wood into coals for his sand-lined pits. The camera was stationed in such a way as to take in both Jackie and the roaring fire behind him. He was not just giving an extemporaneous lecture; rather, he was answering a question posed by the producer of the show as to what he thought the origin of barbeque was.

Well, Jackie said as the camera rolled, I was told that once there was a Chinaman who kept his pigs in his house, and one day, his house burned down and the pigs were trapped insideand that was how barbeque was born.

While Jackie was saying this, I was standing behind the producer and looking directly at Jackie, shaking my head from side to side in an attempt to keep him from saying such a thing on what I knew was to be a nationally televised show. I dont really know, Jackie continued with a twinkle in his eye, thats just what Ive been told. And then he laughed as if he was letting them in on a joke. Sure enough, when the program was aired some six months later, they left that bit of barbeque lore in.

The Modern Marvels crew filming the old-fashioned way of making of charcoal at Jackie Hites restaurant. Courtesy of the author.

First of all, if a pig had been trapped in a burning building, it would have been a roasted pig, not a barbequed one. And most importantly, it certainly didnt happen in Chinathe invention of barbeque, that is.

Barbeque is so popular that it, like victory, has one thousand fathers, and many of them have been alluded to on television shows on the Food Channel, the History Channel, PBS and heaven knows how many more that have tried to explore this popular subject. Since television is an insatiable consumer of filmed footage, there are many peopleproducers, writers, cameramen and otherstoiling out in the countryside gathering all the shots they can as they try to put together a show that will have some semblance of fact for Americas newfound hunger for reality TV. Often, those shows are rather interesting and informative. But when it comes to the history of barbeque, all of these showsor at least all I have seen so far, and that is pretty much all that have been aired in the last decadehave struck out when they try to get their facts straight about the origin and history of barbeque. I suspect that the real reason all these sincere souls have failed so badly in getting it right is the fact that most of these TV crews are not Southerners and wouldnt know real barbeque if you hit them in the face with it. And since you cant teach it if you dont know it, most of those on television who are putting out their message are out of the loop, history wise, and they simply cant, given their educational handicap, present it correctly.

Well, to be fair, a lot of the recent history of barbeque has been pretty good on those shows, especially the ones in which they interview some old-timers in the business who have been around for fifty or sixty years or so and who learned the business at their fathers knees. And they can certainly do the job on recent developments in the barbeque-sauce business since that business, in a successful nationwide sense, dates back only to the 1940s. But on the subject of the origins of barbeque, the true origin of real barbeque has been remarkably elusive.

Indeed, there is a reason for that elusiveness. As indicated above, the old saying about victory is that it has a thousand fathers, while defeat is an orphan. Since real barbeque is probably the best-loved food in America, it is a victory in itself, and everyone wants to claim its invention. Of course, some of those claims are so ludicrous on their very face that they can be easily dismissedlike the fellow I saw on some show who swore that barbeque was first invented in New York City. But some claims, due mostly to the remarkable confusion that exists as to what real barbeque actually is, are not so easily dismissed or even intelligently discussed for that matter.