Story Time Courtesy of Norm Matthews and the Kansas City History Geeks

I wish I could make this a short story, but it is a story of how Kansas City became the BBQ capital of the World. Henry Perry was from Tennessee and worked in riverboat restaurants on the Mississippi and Missouri rivers before he moved to Kansas City. He sold smoked meats from a roadside stand before opening the first BBQ restaurant in Kansas City. It appears as though it was probably the only BBQ restaurant in the USA at that time. By the time he died he had three restaurants and was called The BBQ King.

One of the managers of one of his stores was Charlie Bryant. His brother Arthur worked with him. That was the beginning of Arthur Bryant BBQ. At Henry Perrys death, his pitmaster Arthur Pinkard, went to work for Old Kentuk BBQ, It was a rundown place when George Gates bought it but Arthur came with the place. George and his son Ollie learned all about Henry Perrys BBQ methods before Pinkard retired and died soon after.

The picture below is the first Gates BBQ restaurant. So the two most successful early restaurants both owe the KC style of BBQ to Henry Perry. If that first person had been someone else, maybe BBQ would not have been as good and Kansas City may have latched on to some other kind of food to call its own.