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Pete Harris Cafe knows recipe for success
Welcome mat is always out at Shreveport eatery
John Goodman
jgoodman@nsnews.com
When Jesse Jackson visits the Pete Harris
Cafe in Shreveport he always orders the same thing - red beans and rice with smoked sausage.
Famous for its southern Creole and Cajun dishes the northern Louisiana eatery, one of the oldest continuously owned and operated African American restaurants in the United States, has hosted its share of movers and shakers over the years - in fact if you want to get your message out to the community it's common knowledge that it's best if you stop by. And that's exactly what politicians have been doing in the months leading up to the U.S. midterm elections next Tuesday, Nov. 7.
"It's heating up now," says Truman Trammell, the Pete Harris
Cafe's managing general partner. "They're coming out of the woodwork. Last Saturday morning we had a breakfast for one of the candidates that's running for re-election."
There was a time when you walked in the front door of Freeman and Harris (the predecessor to the Pete Harris
Cafe) and on the right there was a wall filled with posters of candidates. "It's always been like that," says Trammell. "One guy asked Pete, 'Do you only have Democrats on this wall?' Pete, who was a very humble guy said, 'If you're running for office you can put your poster on that wall.' This guy was trying to be smart - this was the time when (racist KKK member) David Duke was running and I guess you know of his political affiliations - so he says 'How about David Duke - would you put his picture up there?' Pete says, 'If David Duke is running for office he's welcome to go up on the wall. We don't discriminate.'"
Everybody was welcome on the wall. "The word used to be if you wanted to get elected in politics you have to go through Freeman and Harris," says Trammell. "It was a hub. Still is."
The current Pete Harris Cafe is named after Trammell's father-in-law. The original restaurant, Freeman and Harris, was founded in 1923 by Harris' uncles Van Freeman and Jack Harris. When it started up if you were black and you came to Shreveport the only place you could eat was Freeman and Harris. Cultural icons such as Ralph Bunche, Joe Louis, Jackie Robinson and Lionel Hampton regularly passed through the restaurant's doors.
Pete Harris was born in New Orleans and attending university when he was summoned by his entrepreneurial uncles up north. "They called his mother," says Trammell laughing. "To paraphrase they said 'Send that boy up here we need him to go to work.' He came up reluctantly, kicking and screaming, as he didn't want any part of it. But once he got into it he gave it his all. That was about 1938 or '39."
Shortly after Harris arrived in Shreveport he was drafted and headed off to fight in Europe. "He was hooked up with some outfit that had some affiliation with Patton's army," says Trammell. "After the war he came back and went to work at the
Cafe as they called it."
In 1953 Freeman and Harris rewarded their young charge with the position of business manager. "He had a good sense of how to get things done," says Trammell. "Freeman and Harris also went down to Natchitoches on the Cane River, where Pete's family originated, and got a couple of other young fellas - his cousins - Arthur Chapman and Wilmer Wallette and they came up and started working in the restaurant."
Arthur Chapman was known as Scrap and Wilmer Wallette's nickname was Tody. Chapman took over the role of custodian - he looked after the equipment and the building while Wallette cooked and acted as general manager. The three young cousins helped build up the business. "Freeman and Harris started out as a two-room house," says Trammell. "They kept adding on and adding on. Somewhere in the late '50s with the coming of AT&T, which is a big employer here in the city, the restaurant started making quite a bit of money. I think the economics of the area changed and the business started to grow. When Uncle Van left town he sold his share to Jack Harris and also some went to other members of his family. Eventually Pete was given 30 per cent by his uncle and Scrap was given 30 per cent but they didn't treat it as 'I own more than you' - that didn't play into it. They actually shared pretty equally in the proceeds and the salaries and all that stuff. It didn't go down on ownership lines. They were cousins and that's the way they did it. They did whatever it took to survive. The business started to grow and if I'm not mistaken it was about the late '50s or early '60s Jack Harris passed away leaving Pete, Tody and Scrap as the owners of Freeman and Harris."
The three cousins established the business further and became influential members of the community. During the '70s they started to think about the future and sought new blood for the restaurant just as their uncles had done many years before. Some came willingly while others had the decision made for them.
Scrap's son Brother had grown up around Freeman and Harris and knew all the ins and outs of the restaurant business. He was trained as a chef but was working as a railroad brakeman when he got the call. "I always thought he was a damn fool to leave a $100-a-day job to come back to a nickel and dime restaurant," Trammell chuckles. "But it was something he enjoyed doing and that's all there was to it. Brother came back in '74 at the same time as my brother-in-law Bobo - Pete Harris' adopted son Robert Gilyard. Bobo was enticed into coming out of the military after 14 years to come back to the restaurant."
Truman Trammell was married to Pete's daughter Beverly but had never given any thought to working in the family business. "I got out of the military and I drove to Shreveport on June 30, 1976. I had left Arizona that night and drove all that night, slept the next day and drove the next night. I got in here on the morning of the second of July and I was just going to spend the weekend and then go down to Atlanta to work for Delta Airlines. I was an avionics technician in the military for 20 years. The old man asked me what I was doing the next night and I said, 'Well, I don't have anything. I don't have a job I'm just passing through.' He said, 'Come down and give us a hand. Do you mind?' I said, 'No I don't mind.' His idea of giving him a hand was actually going to work and I never got to Atlanta. I went to work. We did what we had to do. We worked hard. 12 hours. It's the restaurant business - there is nothing easy about it."
Tody Wallette's wife inherited his share of Freeman and Harris when he passed away in 1976. After the changeover the family restaurant's informal credo of one for all and all for one no longer applied and the courts got involved in ownership disputes. Pete Harris would always sit at a front table in the restaurant drinking coffee and talking with his cronies but after his death in September, 1992 his paternal direction was sorely missed and the goodwill between the various partners evaporated. Shortly after his death a court decision gave the Wallette faction control of the restaurant.
"Me and my wife and my brother-in-law were out of jobs," says Trammell. "This was September, early October '92. I got together with my brother-in-law and my cousin and asked them a couple of questions. 'Fellas - what do you want to do? Do we want another restaurant? Can we work together? Can we respect each other's ideas? Do what we've got to do.' We all decided we were going to do that."
Many of their colleagues at Freeman and Harris wanted to join them at a new location. "We had people that wanted to quit," says Trammell. "I told them, 'Look, I appreciate your sentiment but your first obligation is to your family. You can't help your family out by quitting to make a statement. You've got to take care of your family. If we get another restaurant and it could be four or five months in the future and you want to come to work for us you're welcome to. And that's what happened. There was a mass exodus."
Pete Harris had left them an old A&P building and the displaced restaurateurs hired architects and a contractor to realize their plans. "First of all we had a problem with the name," says Trammell. "My brother-in-law wanted to name it Pete's Place. I said that's kind of generic. 'What is Pete's Place? Is that a pool hall or a restaurant? Shoeshine stand, what is it?' I said, 'We've got a good name here let's capitalize on Pete's name and my mother-in-law (Virginia Rainey Harris*) said, 'Fine, let's use his name.' So we decided on the Pete Harris
Cafe.
"We could have said restaurant but Pete never called Freeman and Harris a restaurant, he always called it a
Cafe. Always did. He never even said 'Cafe'. He always said 'caafay' with a long southern sound." The Pete Harris
Cafe opened on May 17, 1993 and has been in business ever since. Freeman and Harris at the original location closed for good in 1994 less than two years after the change of hands.
The food hasn't changed much over the years. What worked then, works now, give or take a few ingredients. Massive portions are the norm but that's common all over the American South. At the Pete Harris
Cafe you can expect good downhome food and lots of it.
"We have the same basic menu," says Trammell. "We added some things. We took one dish and named it after Scrap - Scrap's Delight is spaghetti with a creole sauce, smoked sausage and ground beef with cheese on top. And then we have another dish we call Pete's Favourite. We take bell pepper and onion and cut them julienne-style. Then we saut‚e onions with the shrimp and make a cream sauce to serve over white rice. Scrap loved spaghetti and Pete liked shrimp."
Stuffed shrimp is a specialty of the house but each day of the week has a different taste treat. "Friday's lunch special is very popular," says Trammell. "We serve barbecued spare ribs with potato salad. We also have filleted fish, baked turkey wings and cornbread dressing. Those go over quite well. Tuesday's a good day as well. Everybody refers to Tuesday as Chicken Day because we have fried chicken on Tuesdays. We always have three or four entrees but fried chicken is on Tuesdays. Monday it's smothered chicken."
Other items on the lengthy menu include Louisiana staples such as gumbo and catfish with a choice of side dishes such as chitlins, grits and collard greens. The restaurant is open seven days a week, 8 a.m. to midnight, Sunday through Wednesday and later on Thursday, Friday and Saturday.
The Cafe hosts national and local speakers weekdays at the Tuesday Morning Breakfast Club. Started about five years ago the informal gathering is open to the public and features a wide range of topics to ponder.
Trammell's son Craig runs the dayshift and another son Shanti is kitchen manager in the evening. "A lot our cooks were trained right here," he says. "We bring them in young and train them. Pete trained Christopher Haley to make lemonade a long time ago. He started in '90 or '91 while he was still in high school and he's now the chef on the night shift."
Currently the Pete Harris Cafe has about 65 employees. The proud staff are like an extended family and many have worked there for decades. "Chef William Hunt started when he was a little boy 12 or 13 years old," says Trammell. "Picking up paper around the place and he chefed until Freeman and Harris went out of business in '94. He was there for a good 25 to 30 years."
Thelma Davis and Virginia Weathers worked as waitresses for decades. Davis started in 1949 and was an employee through 1997 while Weathers started in 1952 and worked continuously until she got sick in 2000. Sandra Mitchell began in 1975 and is still working although she cut back on her hours in 2005. Ethel Gilyard started in 1976 with Trammell and just retired earlier this year. "A lot of good people," says Trammell. "If it were not for them the restaurant couldn't make it."
If you go:
- The Pete Harris Cafe is located at 1355 Milam Street, Shreveport, LA 71101, 318-425-4277. To view their menu go to www.accessusaonline.com/petecafe/peteharris/.
- Shreveport's major claim to fame with Canadians is the fact that it was once home to the Pirates who were part of the CFL's ill-fated expansion down south in 1994 and 1995. They were owned by the notorious Glieberman's which further doomed the franchise to ignominy. The Pirates lost to the B.C. Lions 67-15 in '94 and beat them 20-19 the next year. Both games were played in Vancouver. There are no direct flights to Shreveport from the West Coast - American Airlines offers a commuter service from Dallas and Continental makes eight trips a day from Houston.
- Casinos and game-playing culture are a big deal in the Shreveport-Bossier area with six major hotel complexes operating in the vicinity. Most are situated near the Red River which divides Shreveport (population of 188,000) from Bossier City (56,000). The combined metro area is the economic and cultural centre of the region known as Ark-La-Tex.
- For an African American Heritage Tour of Shreveport-Bossier online go to the Northwestern State University's Louisiana Regional Folklife Program website at www.nsula.edu/regionalfolklife/aamct/default.html.
- For more information on the Shreveport area and local election coverage go to www.shreveporttimes.com. General information for travelers is also available at www.shreveport-bossier.org. For more information on travel in the state of Louisiana go to www.louisianatravel.com.
published on 11/05/2006
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