Barbecue Bob History and Art

The Art

The picture above is not a photo of the real Barbecue Bob. The chef and guitar represents Barbecue Bob. I couldn’t find a free photo to use of him. You can see the real Barbecue Bob here …

The History

Robert Hicks better known as Barbecue Bob. A cookin man! A musician man! Born Sept. 11, 1902. Died young at age 29 on Oct. 21, 1931. But he was born in Walnut Grove, Georgia. His parents, Charlie and Mary Hicks, were farmers. He and his brother, Charlie Hicks, together with Curley Weaver, were taught how to play the guitar by Curley’s mother, Savannah “Dip” Weaver. Bob began playing the 6-string guitar but picked up the 12-string guitar after moving to Atlanta, Georgia, in 1924. He became one of the prominent performers of the newly developing Atlanta blues style.

In Atlanta, Hicks worked at various jobs, playing music on the side. While working at Tidwells’ Barbecue in a north Atlanta suburb, he came to the attention of Columbia Records talent scout Dan Hornsby. Hornsby recorded him and used Hicks’s job to publicize his records, having Hicks pose in chef’s whites and hat for publicity photos and dubbing him “Barbecue Bob”.Before his death in 1931, he married a woman named Claudine and lived off Hillard Street in Atlanta.