Sunday Notes — From the Deep End

Good Mountain Barbecue

And the Great Men Behind It

When people think of barbecue legends, they usually think about the food.

When I think about barbecue legends, I think about two men in Ellijay, Georgia, who taught me more about life than they ever did about pork.

One was impossible to miss. The other would have been perfectly happy if you never noticed him at all.

I am honored to have known them both.

Oscar Poole was larger than life. If you've ever heard of the Pig Hill of Fame (just google it), you've heard of Oscar. When the city told him he couldn't put up a sign for his restaurant, he covered the hillside with wooden pigs instead. Eventually there were thousands of them. He trucked barbecue to Washington after the Republican Revolution of 1994 under the banner "Taking the Pork to Washington." He persuaded Newt Gingrich to campaign in Ellijay. He played the piano brilliantly, improvising hymns, patriotic songs, nursery rhymes, Broadway tunes, and classical music into seamless medleys while customers called out requests. He taught himself Portuguese so he could preach in Brazil. He organized a literacy program in Kentucky that taught thousands of adults to read and earned him the title of Kentucky Colonel.

People assumed Oscar loved attention. He clearly did, but I know Oscar also loved people. The attention was simply how he got them to stop long enough to listen.

I was eating at the shack he called a restaurant one afternoon. It was literally a travel trailer he had pulled into a flat spot cut out of a hillside. There was no Pig Hill of fame, but on this visit I noticed a handful of wooden pigs on the hill out back. They had names on them - his family, a few friends. I asked Oscar what it took to get my own pig on the hill.

"You have to have an honest face, good intentions, and five dollars," he said.

Then he smiled. "If you've got the five dollars, the first two are negotiable."

He chuckled to himself and said, “That’s pretty good - I’m going to use that.”

The rest, as they say, was history.

What many people never knew was that the barbecue restaurant existed largely to finance Oscar’s mission trips to Brazil. Oscar and his wife, Edna, lived modestly while giving away remarkable amounts of their time, talent, and money. He bought a portable keyboard and self-funded multiple mission trips to Brazil.

I still have a signed print of the painting of the Pig Hill of Fame that Oscar gave me. It hangs in my office. Every time I see it, I remember the man more than the pigs.

Oscar Poole

The Pig Hill of Fame

Then there was Bill Prouty. If Oscar was the headline, Bill was the story.

His restaurant, Mr. P's Takeout Barbecue, wasn't famous outside Gilmer County. It didn't have a hillside covered with pigs. Bill wasn't a promoter. He wasn't eccentric. He wasn't trying to become a local legend.

In my humble, yet informed opinion, his barbecue was better.

Bill and his wife, JoAnn, operated a foster home supported by the Southern Baptist Convention. The Convention paid for the children. Bill's barbecue stand paid for Bill and JoAnn.

During the late 1980s I organized the Moving the Mountains Youth Rally, a week of free Christian concerts each summer at the Gilmer County High School football stadium. What started as something to give local teenagers a positive place to spend summer evenings grew into an event that drew youth groups from across Georgia and eventually much of the Southeast. By the fourth year, three thousand people filled the home stands each night.

Bill volunteered to help. With his experience in food service I asked him to handle the concession stand. I thought we might be able to offset some of the expenses of a week of free concerts with revenue from hot dogs and Cokes. He had a different idea.

"What if we made those free too?"

He convinced the local Coca-Cola bottler and Tom's Snacks to donate soft drinks and chips. Local businesses and individuals contributed hot dogs and buns. Volunteers cooked and served every night.

For five evenings, teenagers (actually people of all ages were welcome) could come hear music, listen to speakers, enjoy food and drinks, and never spend a penny.

Bill never wanted credit. He just wanted people served.

Bill Prouty

Mr. P’s Takeout

Years later I became pastor of a small church near Atlanta. One of the first young couples to join the church introduced themselves. They worked with one of Truett Cathy's foster homes.

Before long the young man asked me a question.

"Were you involved with something called the Moving the Mountains Youth Rally in Ellijay?"

I told him I was.

He smiled. "My youth group came from Atlanta when I was in high school," he said. "That's where I became a Christian."

Influence is interesting. You almost never know where it ends. Most of us have no idea how what we are doing today is impacting the lives of those around us - and those who later would be influenced by them. Like the ripples in a pond, Bill and Oscar’s selfless deeds of service continue to touch lives.

Looking back, I realize Oscar and Bill taught me lessons from completely different directions that somehow arrived at exactly the same destination.

Oscar taught me that there's nothing wrong with getting people's attention if you're trying to point them toward something worthwhile. Tell a story. Build a Pig Hill of Fame. Superglue a quarter to the floor just to have fun watching people stoop to pick it up. Make them laugh. Surprise them. Give them something they'll remember.

Bill taught me that changing lives rarely requires a spotlight. Sometimes it looks like grilling hot dogs for thousands of strangers and never expecting anyone to know your name.

One man is unforgettable because everyone knew him.

The other is unforgettable because everyone who knew him loved him.

Both spent their lives serving other people.

Both used barbecue to fund something far more important than barbecue.

Both changed more lives than they'll ever know.

When I think about success, I don't think first about business, money, or recognition.

I think about Oscar Poole.

I think about Bill Prouty.

And I wonder whether, when my own story is finished, someone will be able to say that I used whatever gifts I had to leave people a little better than I found them.

If they can, I'll have been in very good company.

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