Meat cutter sees self as last of dying breed
Arlester Maxie doesn’t know how to read those old-time butcher’s scales he saw as a child in Cracker Maxwell’s Grocery Store in Bivins.
But at age 15 he walked into Brookshire’s Supermarket and asked to be an apprentice in the meat department. He was willing to learn those scales and everything else about the butcher’s job.
That day in June was 40 years ago. He’s been with Brookshire’s meat department ever since.
But he believes he will be the last to do so—especially for such a length of time. He doesn’t see much future for the butcher’s trade.
Meat is being prepackaged, not cut locally. Like the old weigh scale, there’s no longer a need for a human to read them. Anyone can put out a package. It’s already weighed. Just scan it for the computer.
What Maxie says he will miss most is the one-on-one interaction of the person who cuts the meat, displays it and advises the customer.
The understanding of how to take beef out of the pasture and get it ready for the skillet is becoming ever more remote.
Maxie makes an important distinction about his trade. A butcher is a person who slaughters the animal. But a meat cutter is a highly skilled art. He’s the one who dresses the flesh and presents it.
“Those knives are sharp, and you must work fast and to perfection,” he said. “To be a journeyman meat cutter is a skill.”
Maxie was an Atlanta High DECCA student at the time he applied with Brookshire’s. Within a few weeks, the store and the youth knew they had a career together. He apprenticed for two years.
“Minimum wage was as $1.60 an hour as the time, and I was making $1.90. Working 46 hours a week while going to school. I was bringing home more money than some family men.”
It wil be a strange twist of fate that a career such as this which has brought him such pleasure may not long continue.
“It’s a dying trade because, for example, when Wal-Mart got rid of its butchers and meat cutters and started handling only packaged meats, they could tell the packing houses what and how to provide the meat. Now, that’s all those manufacturers are going to provide,” Maxie said.
“That means soon the meat won’t be available any more as a hanging half side of beef. Even Brookshire’s
gets all its meat in sections and in boxes right now.
“We still have everything to cut the meat, such as the knives, saws, grinders and tenderizers. We make what the customer wants and can still fill special orders. I never know what my day will be like. But one day that won’t be so. It’s an extinct outlook for the trade.”
If cutting meat does end with Maxie, it will also take two other of his top personal traits: his smile and person-to-person skills.
“It was always the one-on-one with the public that I liked most about being a meat-cutter,” he said. “I have people call me on my day off or at home. Now such customers are a blessing, but I take off Wednesdays and Sundays since I am a pastor at Shiloh Baptist Church. Those two jobs are alike. In both you still are talking to and helping people.”
The butcher is also a burly person. This is not as job for lightweights, and Maxie’s shoulders and torso are firm and strong after 40 years. He said he feels young at 56.
“The animal is heavy. Even the boxes we receive may weigh up to 90 pounds if rib-eye. You have to unpack those 18-wheelers that deliver, and in the old days, we did it by hand. But even today you have to be strong and fast to handle meat, and it’s done in the cold too.”
One has to be careful, too. Maxie has three crushed fingers from getting a hand caught in the tenderizing machine.
“When I first started, we always got cuts on our bare hands. But today, we have the cut-resistant gloves.”
One has to cut accurately, leaving a certain amount of trim and fat and getting the most out of a section, because missing a cut means losing one’s profit.
“Our margin is narrow. Even the trim is thrown away without pay. Some times we don’t make money at all on the meat we prepare.”
Today’s health requirements and record-keeping are much stricter too. Maxie must record information about everything he cuts.
“I keep a log book for everything. So we can trace it back to where it came from, name, where, date and what the meat is, whether farm-raised or wild, its country of origin and more. Lots of book work.”
He must be on constant health watch as well.
“Take grinding for an example. We do grinding only in the morning because after that I have to clean and sanitize the machine. So if a customer comes in the afternoon and asks for grinding, I have to tell him we can do it the next morning.”
Meats are kept separate too. “You don’t cross-contaminate anything,” he said.
Love and appreciation of fine meats is a reason for being a butcher, one who interacts with people daily, helping them discover new meats.
It is a fine vocational trade. When it goes, it will be the special ordering that will be missed.
Sometimes Maxie will get an order for 50 pounds of smoked sausage or 600 rib-eyes from the local school. The churches will have special occasions and needs. He’ll cut and fill those.
He may have to advise the housewife who must cook a certain part of the meat and wants to know the best precedures. Saving money and taste are important especially when its comes to meat.
The relationship between the customer and the butcher has always been a close one. But times change.
Maxie’s 40 years have meant good pay and benfits “once you become journeyman,” he noted.
And the son of George and Corine Maxie has attained other strong memories. His mother had 18 children. His grandmother Ida of Kildare lived to be 113.
“Rub-a-dub-dub, three men in a tub, all scrubbing their way out to sea,” the children’s poem goes. “The butcher, the baker, the candlestick maker.”
One of these men has already lost his place in the tub. Maxie is one of the two still paddling.