Jennifer Ganter and Katy Jackson
When a honky-tonk is your childhood hangout, you learn early how to play quarters and hustle pool. At StoryCorps, sisters Jennifer Ganter and Katy Jackson talk about the Dixie Chicken, a Texas A&M icon that they inherited from their father.
- [Jennifer] We basically grew up half our life in the Dixie Chicken which is a bar which is kind of weird for children to be growing up in.
- [Katy] Like a home away from home.
- [Jennifer] Yeah.
- [Katy] 'Cause we were there so much.
- [Jennifer] Yeah.
- [Jennifer] There was an upstairs at the Dixie Chicken so we had a bed. You could hear all the music so we grew up listening to very old country music.
- [Katy] Merle Haggard.
- [Jennifer] Yes.
- [Katy] Remember when Dad would make the employees stack up all the chairs. We'd push the tables to the wall. We could ride our four wheelers inside.
- [Jennifer] Yes. We rode our four wheelers inside a bar.
- [Katy] Before we would open.
- [Jennifer] Yes.
- [Katy] We were playing quarters.
- [Jennifer] Quarters is a drinking game but we didn't drink.
- [Katy] Right, no we didn't drink but we would hustle people in pool
- [Katy ] Yes. My first date with Tom, my husband, Tom had to drop me off back at the Dixie Chicken. I think we're more street smart.
- [Jennifer] Yeah no one ever thought I'd even go to college. I did graduate from Texas A&M
- [Katy] We both did.
- [Jennifer] Yeah, we both did but I think we grew up faster than most younger kids but then we had the other side of it at our mom's house which is very structured.
- [Katy] Yeah, mom was a school teacher.
- [Jennifer] She was a school teacher so it was very structured. Our parents got divorced when we were young so they split time equally. So we had the best of both I think. What do you think the traditions are at the Dixie Chicken?
- [Katy] Well, I think the biggest one is probably ring dunk.
- [Jennifer] Ring dunk is you get your Aggie Ring. Aggie Ring is very sacred around here. It's a very special moment. You're supposed to dunk it in a 64 ounce pitcher of beer and drink the whole thing yourself. That started at the Dixie Chicken.
- [Katy] Yeah.
- [Jennifer] It still happens today. The TABC, which is the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission.
- [Katy] They frown upon it.
- [Jennifer] They frown upon that but yeah. If you don't know how to play 42 you can learn how to play at the Dixie Chicken. It's our big domino game that we have. Who do you think the most memorable patron is? Colonel House?
- [Katy] Yeah, Colonel House.
- [Jennifer] Colonel House, he was a Colonel in the army and he went and served at Vietnam and he's been coming there forever and he still comes. If the man is in the Dixie Chicken you will know it because he will come by and say hi to your table.
- [Katy] Mm hmm. One of the biggest things that makes our doing this different from Dad doing this is that we're the only women.
- [Katy] It's a women-run.
- [Katy] Women bar owners.
- [Jennifer] Yes.
- [Katy] And that was hard. It took a lot to get us taken seriously. Dad used to say that because we were his kids we had to be the first one there, the last one to leave and the dirtiest ones in the buildings.
- [Jennifer] Toilet scrubbing, filling ketchup bottles.
- [Katy] Oh, I had.
- [Jennifer] We had to do all the grunt work.
- [Katy] Right.
- [Jennifer] Why do you think we work well together?
- [Katy] We're yin and yang. I think we're complete opposites.
- [Jennifer] We are complete opposites.
- [Katy]So we sort of balance each other out, you know?
- [Jennifer] Yeah, and if you don't like something I'll do it. If I don't like it, you'll do it.
- [Katy] Right.
- [Jennifer] We try to keep things the same there as they've always been.
- [Katy] I think it's one of our biggest things. We want people to.
- [Katy] Feel like they're coming home.
- [Katy] Feel like they're coming home like we did. We have the swinging doors. You want people to come through the same swinging doors that they did when they were in college in 1979 or '77.
- [Jennifer] We still try to hold steadfast to playing progressive country music and we play the same song every night when we close.
- [Katy] Goodnight Irene. We've said that since day one, that you and I want to keep on with the keepin' on.
- [Jennifer] Yeah.
- [Katy] With what Dad set out to do but doing it our way. I want it to mean to the generation that we leave it to as much as it did when it was left to us.