In “Father, Son, Fire: A Chat with Howard and Harrison Conyers,” the fourth episode in Gravy’s five-part series on barbecue, Howard Conyers—a barbecue expert and NASA rocket scientist—introduces listeners to a formative influence in his barbecue education and journey: his father, Harrison Conyers. 

Some people find barbecue, but the Conyers family was born into a barbecue tradition that survived in the community. Growing up in the small town of Paxville, South Carolina, Howard didn’t go to restaurants to eat barbecue. Within a five-mile radius, there was no shortage of whole hog barbecue cooks (and the “whole hog” part was always implied). 

Howard has spent years researching the Black origins of barbecue and traveled the world to gather stories of others who work the pits. His passion for barbecue comes from his own childhood, as he grew up in a family of skilled barbecue cooks. The contributions of cooks in Southern barbecue pits are widely overlooked, especially those that are not affiliated with restaurants covered widely in mainstream media, or those from rural, agrarian areas of the South. 

Howard now lives in New Orleans, but he travels home often to barbecue with his family. In this special episode of Gravy, Howard interviews his father—whom he calls a hidden figure in his work and the world of barbecue—about some of his favorite projects that the two have worked on together over the years. 

In this episode of Gravy, Howard and Harrison first discuss farming and its link to barbecue cultures across the South, as those who worked the fields during Harrison’s generation were the same people preserving the barbecue tradition we know. Next, they recall working together to barbecue a whole cow in the tradition of smoking steers and ox in the American South. Harrison used his skills as a master welder to bring Howard’s complex pit design to life for the Gumbo Jubilee in New Orleans. Finally, they talk about the barbecue pit that Harrison and countless other people of his era knew in the ground, which used metal pipes in place of tree limbs. Barbecue changes as the country progresses, Howard notes, but it’s important to remember the past. Stories of other teachers of this craft, and his experiences cooking with his father, inspire his research and work.