“Hotter Than a Pistol”: The Story of Bob’s Quality Meats

Feature photo by Mohammed Kloub. South Seattle Emerald.

Bob Ackley: “We named that sausage Texas Hot and it’s hotter than a pistol.”

Bob Ackley owned and operated Bob’s Quality Meats in Columbia City for nearly twenty years. He is a third-generation meat man, and his son Jim, who has now taken over the business, is the fourth generation.

Bob’s father moved to Eastern Washington from Kansas in 1919. After several years selling meat door to door off a wagon, he opened a meat market in Cowitchie, Washington, near Yakima. Bob grew up in the business: he was ten years old when his older brothers went off to fight in World War II and he went to work with his dad at the meat market. He moved to the Seattle area in the 1960s, worked as a manager at Food Giant and Tradewell stores, and then opened Bob’s Quality Meats in West Seattle. He expanded the business and opened another meat market in Ballard. By 1980 his kids were grown, and the West Seattle meat market was too big for Bob.

My wife stayed home. She raised the kids. When they were older, then she wanted to join me, see. And I couldn’t think of a nicer person to help me. We had found out that there was a meat market by the name of Nelson’s Meats, on Rainier Avenue, 4861, right here. And how this come about, now—do you want to hear that little story? Okay.

Bob and Louise Ackley at Bob’s Quality Meats, 1989. Photograph courtesy of Bob Ackley.

In 1981, I believe, these folks were coming to the West Seattle store, and said they lost their meat man. And, who was that? “Butch Nelson [in] Columbia City.” Well. I thought, “Where is Columbia City anyway?” ‘Course [they] said, “It’s just over the hill,” so a couple of weeks later my wife and I happened to drive by here. And here was this little meat market. There was a men’s store right on the corner, and [the owner] happened to have a key [to the meat market], so, he showed it to us. I said, “How can I get a hold of the owner?” “Oh, her name’s Fran Nelson.” You would have just loved that woman. She was so great. We did everything on a handshake. That’s how we used to do business, see? Bob and Louise Ackley at Bob’s Quality Meats, 1989.

So we moved lock stock and barrel over here. We had kind of a mini-Grand Opening, targeting a lot of my West Seattle people, see. Which worked out very well. Then I started targeting the folks over here. The gentleman who owned The Facts paper, he has passed away since, but his son runs the paper now. Well, I called him up and I said, “I want to run something in your paper.” So he said, “That’s okay,” he said, “You’re just starting out down here, I’ll put it on our front page for the first three months.” And you know what, doggone it, for the front page, can you imagine, he wanted twenty-five bucks for that. [Laughs] So, you see, he give me pretty good deal.

Anyway, that’s how we started off here. I run the ads in the paper for about three months. Now, I also advertised in the South District Journal. And also The [Seattle] Medium. I didn’t put anything in the other papers except just a classified. Then when I got through with [The Facts] front-page things, we went into the back page for about three weeks. Then we didn’t need advertising anymore. That’s all we did. And the wife and I had a very, very successful business down here.

Bob’s new clientele was different from the West Seattle customer base, and he quickly adapted to serve the growing African American population in Rainier Valley.

In just moving just a few miles over here, I didn’t know what I was in for. [It was] a big change. My supplier said for me to come over here and sell junk. I says, “I won’t do that. I’ve never done that. All I sell is the best I can buy.” He says, “You won’t stay in business.” I said, “Well, everywhere I’ve gone I have.” He says, “You won’t here.” I says, “You know, I don’t believe that. These people deserve to have a good place to come buy decent meat, see.” So that’s what I did. However, [when] I put out some Swedish potato sausage [people said,] “What’s that?” They didn’t know what Swedish potato sausage was. “Okay, what do you like?” “I like somethin’ that’s hot.” So, I proceeded to develop sausages that were hot. I’d make a little bit of sausage and I’d cook some and put it on the counter. And I kept doing that until I hear, “Boy, this is just right,” see. And that’s what I did.

Then there was folks that said, “Well, I sure like your sausage, but it’s hotter than a pistol.” So, I made a mild one, see. Basically the same. And then they said, “Well, you know, that’s beef.” But there’s folks that likes a hot pork sausage, you see? So we developed a hot pork sausage. I had some guy send me up some of it from Texas. And I thought, “Boy, I’ll tell you, they buy that down there, their gonna love what I’m gonna fix them.” So I made a real good sausage. We named it Texas Hot and it’s hotter than a pistol. That went over very, very well.

We started out with a nothing sausage business to virtually tons of it, see. They’d send back to the South to get [the sausages they liked].We made sausages for the people here. Exactly what they were going back there for. I said, “You not only don’t have to go anywhere, you’re gonna get a better sausage,” see? Which they did.

“Get those dad-gummed things loaded on my truck.”

The Fourth of July there’s only one thing you think of and that’s ribs, spare ribs. You know what, we unquestionably, without a doubt, have the finest spare ribs you could ever even come close to buying. I have to tell you a little story. This fella I’ve been dealing with for, oh, gosh, twenty years, anyway. His driver, he come in and he said, “Bob, you better come out and take a look at these. I don’t think you’re gonna want any of these things.” I had seventy-five cases of ribs, thirty pounds a case. Now, unfortunately, even Canada has codes, code numbers. Well, they missed mine by one. [Laughs] Yeah, I don’t know what in the world it was [in those boxes]. Anyway, I got on the phone and I called the guy at his home in Canada and I says, “My friend,” I says, “you know the Fourth of July is three days away and I need my shipment and I expect that so-and-so thing down here tomorrow morning.” He says, “You’ll have it.” He says, “I don’t know what went wrong, but I’ll have it for you.” He drove the truck down here. And I had my ribs to start off the next morning, the ones I wanted, see? So this is how we do things.

Then there was one time I ordered some ribs from a business acquaintance, a friend of mine, he was in the wholesale business. And he says, “I don’t have all the ribs that you need. I got the kinds you want but most of them are sold.” I says, “Hey, I had these things on order from you, pal.” He says, “Well, you can’t have them all.” I just got in my truck and I just drove right down there to his plant. He got all these ribs stacked up there and I started getting them. The guy says, “You can’t have them all.” I says, “You know what? Every darned one of those has got my name on them, pal.” He says, “No, they don’t.” And I say, “You gonna do something about it?” “Well, no.” “Okay, get those dad-gummed things loaded on my truck.” I had a great big old pick-up, see? I had those things stacked up like you can’t believe. And, boy, I proceeded to come down here with all my ribs, see. Well, by golly, I ordered them. And I don’t take “no” for an answer on something like that.

[Thanksgiving is another] very busy time. ‘Course I’ve always bought a quality turkey. I mean, it’s one that costs a lot of money compared to what you get in the supermarket. But they are so perfect, you know. We had a lot of folks where you had your young people working and both man and wife are working. And some of these lovely young ladies didn’t know how to cook. So, I got the finest turkey I could get, and we had a timer put into them. Then no matter how bad a cook you are, you can’t make a mistake on this, you see? I paid extra to have these timers put in, for the size of the turkey, specifically, see? And do you know, that developed into a whale of a business over in West Seattle. Over here, I had to get something for a lot of folks that would work out perfect. But at the same time, we had some folks who said, “I’m from the old school. I don’t want anything in my turkey. I don’t even want a timer in it.”

Well, I brought in some nice young turkeys then for those folks. By order only. I mean, you couldn’t [just walk] in and buy a turkey. All I did was just take care of the special orders. Although I always bought extra turkeys—there was two principals and three policemen and one or two college professors that had a memory worse than mine. And they would come in [on the day before Thanksgiving] and they absolutely expected that [there would be a turkey for them]. So I always made sure I had it for them, you know. They’d come in, “I want to get a turkey, Bob,” see? I knew what they wanted and I knew exactly what size they needed. I even had their names on them, see?

That’s the neighborhood business!

Yeah, I had every single customer—ninety-five percent of them, we knew by their first names, see? For the little kids we always had little bags of things— you know, mom comes in and she’s absolutely about to go through the roof, got three or four kids with her. When they come in here, they were little ladies and gentlemen. They knew, if they were, they were gonna get something, see? If I had candy, I’d give them candy. If I run out of candy, I’d give them potato chips, you know, anything. But I made sure, even the ones that couldn’t afford to give their kids something, I made darned sure they’d have something, see? And you know, those kids, they come in, they got families of their own now.

It’s a business that I really enjoy. My dad told me, even when I was younger, he says, “You know, one of these days,” he says, “young man, you’re gonna have to be honest with yourself. You find something you really love and you’ll never work another day the rest of your life.” And that’s what I’ve done, see?

Now, your son has taken over?

He has taken over. He was in the orchard business. I guess he talked to his mother and he says, “Think Dad might be interested in selling the business?” She said, “Well, hadn’t really thought of it.” So it was dropped. I didn’t hear about that for quite a while, see. Then, I guess, a little later on, he started coming over here from Yakima. He’d call up, and he’d say, “Dad, do you mind if I come over and help you Saturday?” “Sure, come on over,” see. So he come over and then, gee whiz, what’s wrong with this guy? Three weeks in a row he wants to come over and help me on Saturday. Shortly after that he called his mom and says, “Think Dad might be interested in selling yet?” And she said, “Well, you’re gonna have to talk to him about that, see?” So, anyway, we talked. He said he was interested in buying it. And I says, “We’ve been talking a little bit about maybe having some good man take over the business and I can’t think of a better man to take it over than you.” And so we got everything all lined up—we just simply walked out the door and he walked in, see? However, I stayed with him, just off and on to help him a little bit to get started, see? I felt confident he could step into the picture, and it’s obvious that he’s doing very well. And we’re mighty proud of him.

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This story is excerpted from the Rainier Valley Food Stories Cookbook. Pick up your copy at the RVHS office or order online to explore more local food and history.