Well, I’m game

Musings of coon supper first-timer

One of my research and writing passions is how politics, foodways, and culture converge. So it’s natural that for several years I have been urged to attend the Gillett Coon Supper and share observations of it.

Often I would hear friends tell me, “Edmonds, you write on this stuff, and you’ve never made it to the coon supper?” So I set off for Gillett for the 77th annual event on Jan. 11.

It was a cold and dreary drive down I-530 from Little Rock past Pine Bluff where the highway became U.S. 65. The mist was so thick, it seemed as though I was driving inside a light bulb. Upon arrival in Gillett, the entire horizon was shrouded.

I’ve had folks tell me that when you come into the town, you think you’ve reached the ends of the Earth. I can’t attest to that, but it’s as remote a place as I have seen in the Arkansas Delta, which is full of remote places in this land dominated by row crop farming. With all the water around, it was not surprising that the largest alligator ever killed in Arkansas, a 13-foot one-inch monster weighing 680 pounds, was done in near Gillett on Sept. 19, 2010.

This is the setting for the coon supper, a monster of an idea that has worked for this community for almost eight decades.

Rex Nelson, a senior editor at the Democrat-Gazette and one of Arkansas’ best storytellers and raconteurs, gave a brief history of the supper on his Southern Fried blog: The first one was held at Stuttgart in 1933, but soon moved. A must-attend event for politicians, it has been hosted by the Gillett Farmers’ and Businessmen’s Club since 1947. When the Gillett School District still existed, the supper basically served as the school’s annual football banquet.

The supper has long been as large an event in Gillett as high school sports are in most rural areas, and that’s huge. The fact that it’s still held in the Gillett School gym years after it consolidated with the DeWitt school is a significant source of community pride.

This was apparent when I got in line in a throng of excited locals, many of whom were engaged in discussions about the Democratic presidential primaries.

I managed to find a couple of familiar faces in that line, among them Doyle Webb, state Republican Party chair, and his wife Barbara, running for Supreme Court. Inside were numerous plaques, signs and paintings commemorating the Gillett sports teams’ history and that of the coon supper; even the windows in the restrooms were painted over with images of the illustrious coon along with messages welcoming visitors.

Once you showed your ticket to the volunteers, you were immediately ushered in. Side dishes—sweet potatoes and brown rice—were already on plates, with desserts and a souvenir glass labeled with the coon supper’s symbol.

No iced tea, though; volunteers passed up and down the line with large pitchers of coffee, fitting on that cold wet night. Coon supper-labeled bottles of water were available too.

Then more volunteers descended on the long rows of tables with the main course: pan upon pan of steaming coon.

I mischievously mentioned the delicacy that I was to partake of to my wife and 20-and 30-something daughters, eliciting the teenage responses of “ew!” “gag” and “gross.” Having been raised eating wild game while growing up in Hope, this was not a big deal. I was quite at home in these surroundings.

I was happy to see more familiar faces as the meeting progressed. Next to me was a lady, a native of Gillett, who now serves as a counselor at Little Rock’s Pulaski Academy. Never one to miss an opportunity to put in a plug for where I serve as historian, I shared some of our education work at the Old State House Museum, as well as opportunities for service.

Master of ceremonies Chad Philipp, pastor of the local Lutheran church and president of the Gillett Farmers’ and Businessmen’s Club, came to the podium to talk about the supper’s history and recognize the people instrumental in pulling off this event every year.

When there was still a school in Gillett, money raised went to pay for things like letter jackets and blankets for the sports teams. In recent years, proceeds are used to refurbish the aforementioned restrooms, but more prominently, over $100,000 in scholarship funds have been raised since the school was closed in 2009.

I read a piece from that period that stated 600-700 tickets were sold yearly. Judging by the crowd that night— with throngs of politicians and a crowd-pleasing band—I could not tell if those numbers had changed at all.

In Gov. Asa Hutchinson’s absence, Lt. Gov. Tim Griffin made remarks, sounding very much like a candidate for governor. It’s a must-attend event, even though many of these officeholders are not up for election this year.

After fellowship with old and new friends, I departed to make my way back toward Gould, Pine Bluff, and finally Little Rock.

It was well worth parting the shroud of mist and venturing into Monster Gator territory to witness the pride of a community powering a continuing tradition.

It reminded me of a passage in a book titled Celebrating the Third Place: Inspiring Stories About The Great Good Places at the Heart of Our Communities. Its author, sociologist Ray Oldenburg, could have been talking about the coon supper as one of those places where its loyalists meet, not just to uphold local tradition but to hold on to their ideal of community and to “speak to us from where they live and from what they hold dear in life.”

Thanks so much, Gillett, for the hospitality and the experience, and hopefully I’ll see you next year.

As for the belief that coon tastes like chicken? Absolutely not. It tastes like, well, coon. But everyone has another meat each year to chase the coon, either brisket or ribs.

It was ribs for me.

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