COUNTRYCLUB
REDNECK Michael Berry and co-founders note sense of community on venue’s third anniversary
STAFFORD — Nita Crow-Powell felt the emotion rise as dozens crowded toward the Redneck Country Club stage. “I’m going to cry,” she said. These were the so-called founding members of the RCC, the brainchild of controversial conservative radiotalk-show host Michael Berry, pausing to take a group photo while celebrating the venue’s third anniversary. Several raised cans of beer toward the camera. Crow-Powell returned with glistening eyes. “Thank God for this place,” she said.
These may not be the rednecks you imagined. Yes, most are white people. Yes, a performer recently played a drum decorated with a Confederate flag. And, yes, they hosted the Super Tuesday party for Ted Cruz. But those aren’t the components by which they define themselves. They insist their connection runs deeper.
Located amid the urban sprawl southwest of Houston, the club is a place members describe as greater than the sum of its parts. It’s not just a restaurant, bar or concert venue. Rather, they say, the Redneck Country Club is a place defined by something larger, where women are respected, veterans honored and people polite and welcoming.
As the outside world reels through a caustic political season, theirs is what Berry called a “safe zone,” where one can freely support those values. Disagree with their ideals, and they find you simply shouldn’t join. But support them, and the result can feel cultlike. Here, the self-identified rednecks eat, drink and two-step. They experience collective accomplishment and loss. Many say the group has changed lives. “There was a destiny here,” Berry says.
The Redneck Country Club story is more about community and togetherness than hostility and bitterness. It begs the question: Why have the rest of us held back?
“The Michael Berry Show” began 11 years ago, earning its host a growing following and a reputation for pushing boundaries. Liberals condemn Berry’s routine, citing racist barbs he uttered on the air.
But Berry, like the club, is hard to peg, showing more sensitivity and political nuance than Rush Limbaugh and the other high priests of right-wing radio.
Berry supporters say the man on the air isn’t the same one they know. And there’s more than a little biographical detail that makes Berry tough to caricature. His wife, Nandita Berry, grew up in India and served as Texas’ secretary of state. (She says she might listen to 15 minutes of his show in the carpool line.) They adopted two sons from Ethiopia.
The man’s interest in people — and dedication to friends — seems genuine. Berry spent six years as a Houston city councilman, beginning in 2002. He talks with radio callers like he knows them.
The impetus for creating his club arose in 2012, when Berry realized listeners didn’t have an easy way to meet. He planned an event at the House of Blues. It sold out within hours, he said. After a few other gatherings, he figured there might be potential for something more.
As it happened, Berry had long had ideas for the club. A native of Orange, on the Louisiana border, Berry said he fell in love as a kid with his grandmother’s cooking. Over lunch at the RCC, he recalled chowing down in her trailer on dishes such as butter beans, collard greens and fried chicken. When she died, he inherited her iron skillet.
As Berry, now 45 and gluten-free, waited for his pork chop, potatoes and vegetables, he described how he became captivated by music, especially Texas country bands. As with food, he believed strongly in the connection music could create.
Befriending local artists, Berry realized how poorly venue operators treated them. The musicians would be charged for water, and the restrooms for them were gross. Berry had a hunch he could do better.
Billy and Connie Stagner, 58 and 60, who have listened to Berry’s show since 2007, were among those who took note when Berry mentioned his idea for a club. They figured it might be a good place to meet new people.
To bring the idea to life, Berry hired Jessica DeSham Timmons, who’d spent 15 years working for Landry’s.“I just knew that it was right,” said Timmons, who is in her 30s.
The process moved quickly: On Aug. 5, 2013, Berry signed the leasepurchase agreement for a former sports bar. The site, hardly a third of a mile off the Southwest Freeway on West Airport, was a mess. The outside patio featured warped, sun-bleached boards. Inside was a splatter-painted cement floor, with an area for Jell-O wrestling.
Early planning discussions occurred in the Berrys’ dining room, his wife recalled. She felt skeptical of the business model, but her only demand was that Berry not take on debt. She says she didn’t yet see the sense of community the place would create. Timmons would oversee club operations. Responsibility for getting the building together fell to Bert Harvey, 43, who earlier that year responded to Berry’s on-air request to fix the vandalized home of an elderly World War II vet.
At Berry’s prompting, Harvey quit his day job to start his own construction company. Berry tasked him with the RCC project, a financial risk that was a big undertaking for a father of two young children. “It was a leap of faith,” Harvey said.
The weekend after the lease was signed, hundreds gathered at the construction site to tailgate and help with demolition. Berry says he felt teary-eyed when he saw how many showed up. There was a power in this community no one had fully understood. Those involved say it’s hard to explain.
People dialing into Berry’s show commonly identify themselves as workmen. As the process got underway, a number offered their services free of charge.
Neal McHenry, 38, who had just launched a lighting company, knew he would help after his first visit to the site, where he was struck by the articulate speech of a member he met. It was a hint of the community of cowboy philosophers he would come to love listening to, tobacco pipe in hand, around the club’s fire pits. McHenry worked on the club’s lighting indoors and out. “I said to myself, ‘You know what, this is not just going to be a business thing. This is going to be a life thing.’ ”
People earned memberships by volunteering. But the effort required funding, too. Berry’s radio producer, Ramon Robles, gave the first donation: $5,000. That earned him naming rights to the restrooms, which are designed to mimic the efficiency of the beloved Texas highway pitstop, Buc-ee’s. Russell Ybarra, the restaurateur behind Gringo’s, donated $50,000.
The Stagners, too, made their donation promptly. They got several hundred of the oldest dollar bills they could from the bank and put them in a sock, the way they say rednecks kept their money. They delivered it to the radio station in a paper sack.
Berry called the couple, who own a jewelry store, and thanked them but explained that they couldn’t open the place without more. He asked for $50,000. They complied.
Similarly, just before the RCC crew planned to open the outdoor space, they learned they needed a sprinkler system they couldn’t afford — dooming the endeavor until Michael Broussard, 44, whose family runs a company that works on such systems, offered to install one.
In total, almost 2,000 members signed up before opening day, Oct. 3, 2013, Timmons said. (The club’s membership is now around 6,500.) Berry likened the process to raising a church.
With membership prices ranging from $250 to $50,000, the names of those contributors are now emblazoned on a wall, along with inscriptions. “PROUD TO BE ASSOCIATED WITH A CLUB OF ETHICAL MORALS AND STANDARDS,” one reads. “AND I THOUGHT A COUNTRY CLUB WOULD NEVER LET ME JOIN,” says another. “FATHER, HUSBAND, REDNECK,” reads a third. Each donation level is named for a gun caliber.
The building looks like the lofty dance hall and cozy backyard for which they’d hoped. The community that grew with it is strong.
Along with a networking group called “RedNet” and a book club called “Redneck Readers,” members gather often for live music. Wednesdays are commonly “pickin’ parties,” akin to events Berry once hosted in his home. (Events are typically open to the public, but members get early access to tickets.)
As Berry envisioned, the venue treats performers like kings, Timmons says. They also sell fried catfish, Frito pie and wings.
The Stagners go to the club at least three times a week. Billy estimates it brought them a hundred new friends. “It’s become … I don’t know, it changed our lives,” Connie said.
The sentiment is often repeated. Gerald Powell, 68, and his wife, Nita, 60, who grew teary at the anniversary party, explained how, after they stopped riding motorcycles, the RCC immediately gave them a place where it felt right to go.
The Powells now try never to miss a weekend. Nita celebrated her birthday there. They invite fellow members to their home on Sundays and holidays. In her purse she carries a note from a former RCC employee who enlisted in the Navy.
Along with the fun, there have been tough times. Nita recalled a memorial service the club hosted for a member who died of a heart attack. She took brisket and beans from the club to another member, Carol Jaynes, 54, after her husband died in June 2015; Berry flew back early from out of state to attend and speak at his funeral in Victoria.
Regulars at the club suggest the place cries out for a kinder, gentler definition of “redneck,” if that’s not too oxymoronic. “We’re taking the awful out of the word ‘redneck’ and making it fun,” Berry says.
The club’s name is meant to be jarring, he says. But it’s also a label that he and others want to reclaim. Why can’t it be good to be a redneck?
In their minds, “redneck” describes someone hardworking, God-fearing and Americaloving. It’s also someone willing to help. A redneck doesn’t have to be white, either, Berry said. The club is working on an ad campaign to include black former pro-football player N.D. Kalu.
The R word is featured proudly throughout the venue. The “VIP” sections are known as “VIR,” for Very Important Redneck, and include outdoor seating areas designed to look like trailers in a trailer park. “THROUGH THIS DOOR WALK THE WORLD’S FINEST REDNECKS,” a sign at the entrance reads. Berry makes a point that “Redneck” should always be capitalized.
It all can strike the uninitiated as a gimmick. But for people here, the word serves as a unifier. It offers common ground. For those feeling isolated in a spread-out city, or locked in ideological warfare of the political season, it’s a refuge. They don’t mean it to be offensive. It’s what they believe.
In members’ minds, “redneck” describes someone hardworking, God-fearing and Americaloving. It’s also someone willing to help.