"maurice bessinger" news and stories

The South's most notorious barbecue joint is warning customers they'll have to buy more pit-cooked pork if they ever want to see the Confederate flag fly again.

Maurice's Gourmet Barbeque's Maurice Bessinger, who hoisted the stars and bars over his nine Columbia-area restaurants on the day, almost a decade ago, when South Carolina permanently lowered the Confederate flag from its capitol dome, told a local television station this week that he could no longer afford to keep his controversial flags flying -- and it's not for the reasons you'd think.

Bessinger's empire, built on a secret recipe for yellow sauce and his reputation as an old-style Southern charmer, was once the nation's biggest commercial barbecue operation. But his open embrace of a symbol indelibly associated with slavery disgusted many of his customers and dismayed most of his business associates. Walmart pulled his Southern Gold sauce off its shelves, and, according to Bessinger's autobiography, Defending My Heritage, the company lost 98 percent of its wholesale business.