The Duck Commander Family

by Robertson, Willie

4. Place fillets in fryer and deep-fry for approximately 7 to 8 minutes until well-done.

  5. Set catfish on paper towels and add one more sprinkle of Cajun Style Seasoning.

  4

  FREE LUNCH

  I AM NOT SAYING THIS BECAUSE I AM IN NEED, FOR I HAVE LEARNED TO BE CONTENT WHATEVER THE CIRCUMSTANCES. I KNOW WHAT IT IS TO BE IN NEED, AND I KNOW WHAT IT IS TO HAVE PLENTY. I HAVE LEARNED THE SECRET OF BEING CONTENT IN ANY AND EVERY SITUATION, WHETHER WELL FED OR HUNGRY, WHETHER LIVING IN PLENTY OR IN WANT. I CAN DO ALL THIS THROUGH HIM WHO GIVES ME STRENGTH.

  —PHILIPPIANS 4:11–13

  I still remember my first day of school. Kay put me on the school bus and waved good-bye.

  Korie: Willie rode the school bus on his very first day of kindergarten! And he wasn’t even scarred for life! I’m kidding, of course, but this did shock me when I first heard it. It was so different from my experience. At our house, the first day of school was a big deal every year, not just kindergarten. Mom would take pictures of us in our “first day” outfits, drive us there, go in and meet the teacher, and make sure we had all of our supplies.

  Today, we make a big deal out of the first day of school in our home as well. We got together with my mom on the first day for a prayer before the kids start the new school year, asking God to bless them and to allow them to be a light for Him to their friends throughout the school year. We’ve been doing that ever since John Luke started his first day of kindergarten. He doesn’t let me take his picture with his teachers anymore, but I still take whatever pictures I can. I, at least, make him take one picture with his brother and sisters on the first day of school and he appeases me, because I’m his mom, and he loves me!

  I can just imagine little Willie getting on that school bus for his first day all by himself, full of confidence and certain that if he just flashed those dimples, the world would be his. And it usually was.

  Somehow I made it to Pinecrest Elementary School and jumped off the bus with my little book satchel. The principal was standing there when I got off the bus.

  “Hey, I’m Willie Jess Robertson and I’m looking for the kindergarten room,” I told him in the most professional way I could.

  The principal pointed down a hall and said, “It’s right down there.”

  I got to my teacher’s room and one of my best friends, Mel Hamilton, was crying because I wasn’t there yet. I consoled him and was proud that someone needed me. School was going to be fun.

  When I started kindergarten, we received free lunches because our family didn’t have any money. I thought everybody was on free lunch; I didn’t even realize we were poor. But there were actually only about three kids in my class receiving free lunches, and I was one of them. There was a little boy who sat in front of me in kindergarten, and I thought he was really poor. He would come to school covered in dirt and didn’t smell very good. One day, I took a bar of soap to school and put it on his desk. I wasn’t trying to be mean or anything; I just didn’t think he had any soap at home. Later in life, once I realized that we were getting the free lunches because we were poor just like that little kid, I remember thinking, “Man, were we that poor?”

  Over the next few years, I noticed that our family was beginning to make more money. When we went from receiving free lunches to getting reduced lunches, I thought that was a sign that Duck Commander was taking off. When we started paying for our own lunches, I thought, “Man, we must be rich now!”

  I THOUGHT EVERYBODY WAS ON FREE LUNCH; I DIDN’T EVEN REALIZE WE WERE POOR.

  The Robertson boys had a good reputation at school. Phil and Kay made sure that we treated our classmates and teachers with respect. They always insisted we behave at school and listen to our teachers. Even if we weren’t the best-dressed students and didn’t even have enough money to pay for our lunches, we were all voted class favorite at one time or another. Actually, I was voted “class favorite” several years in elementary school and was class president in ninth grade, with the campaign slogan “Don’t be silly, vote for Willie!”

  I learned how to make extra money at an early age. I thought I was the cutest kid in school, so I was surely going to use it to my advantage. In elementary school, the concession stand never sold the candy I liked to eat, so I decided I was going to bring my own candy to school and sell it to my classmates. It started with a box of chewing gum someone had given us. I took the gum to school and sold it for thirty cents apiece. Then I had Kay take me to the store, and I bought Lemon Heads, Red Hots, Mike and Ikes, and all sorts of other candy. I stored the candy in my locker, and my classmates started calling me the “Little Tycoon.” I was making like three hundred dollars a week, minus the 10 percent I paid Kay for driving me to the store for supplies.

  Now, there were some occupational hazards associated with the job. Darla Leonard, who rode my school bus, was older than me. She would strong-arm me every morning and make me give her free candy.

  “No, it’s thirty cents,” I would tell her.

  “How about nothing?” Darla would say before grabbing a fistful of my hair.

  It made me so mad, but she was bigger than me, so there wasn’t much I could do about it. She goes to our church now, and I could definitely take her these days. She’s a tiny little woman, so it’s funny to think that I was once scared of her.

  After a few months of selling the candy, the principal called me to his office.

  “I’m hearing you’re selling candy to other students,” Mr. McCall told me. “Are you?”

  There was no denying it.

  “The concession stand’s sales are way down and they’re complaining about it,” the principal said. “I’m going to have to shut you down.”

  I quit selling the candy, but I still found other ways to make money. I sold everything from pencils and erasers to orange juice tops (which I claimed once sat on Abraham Lincoln’s eyes!). The kids were just used to giving me their money, so I found creative ways to take it. I would eat June bugs for fifty cents and sing on the school bus for a quarter. One of my favorite moneymaking schemes involved my turning into a human jukebox. Kids would put quarters under my arms, and I would start singing. The only songs I knew were the ones my older brother Alan had on eight-tracks. Foreigner’s “Juke Box Hero” was always the number one request, but I also sang songs by the Beach Boys, the Gap Band, Molly Hatchet, and Michael Jackson. I was the school bus entertainment. We went to a small country school so everyone lived far apart. I think we were on the bus about two hours each way, so this was a great way to pass the time.

  I WOULD EAT JUNE BUGS FOR FIFTY CENTS AND SING ON THE SCHOOL BUS FOR A QUARTER.

  Phil’s philosophy about education was a lot like his philosophies about everything else in life. If my brothers or I told Phil we wanted to quit high school, he would look at us and say, “You wanna drop out of school? Knock yourself out, but don’t come running to me.” Then Phil would tell us that he wouldn’t recommend quitting school. He would always tell us to make the best grades we could make, get our homework done, earn our diplomas, and get out of there. I’ve heard people talk about “helicopter parenting,” where the parents hover over their kids, watching their every move. There was no danger of that in our house. We were pretty much on our own and were expected to do the best we could do with it.

  Phil never told us we had to go to college or anything like that. If we woke up in the morning and decided we wanted to blow off school, we would just blow it off. Phil would never say anything about it. I never asked for Phil’s permission to stay home; if I didn’t want to go to school, I just didn’t go. But Phil always told me if I missed too many days and got kicked out of school, I would have to deal with the consequences. We missed the maximum amount of days you could possibly miss every year, mainly during hunting season. We took full advantage of sick days to spend time in the woods.

  Korie: This was not the case in my house. If you stayed home from school, you were going to the doctor, so you had to weigh the pros and cons. We took
school seriously. We were never punished for making bad grades or anything like that; it was just expected that we’d work hard in school and do the best we could. And we did. Mom would say that school and the after-school activities we were involved in were our “job,” and we were expected to give it our all. If we started something, we couldn’t just quit it because we didn’t want to do it anymore. We had to finish what we started. If it was a sport, we were part of a team and had a responsibility to our teammates to give it our best.

  Mom was big on our learning new skills, so I took everything from tennis to baton lessons, diving to piano lessons, and played every sport at least one year. I think it gave me confidence that I could do anything if I worked at it. I still impress my kids with my backflips off the diving board and gymnastic tricks on the trampoline, but the piano lessons never stuck. The best I can do today is “Chopsticks,” and I took piano for three years! I just wasn’t good at it. My brother, on the other hand, plays piano beautifully.

  MOM WOULD SAY THAT SCHOOL AND THE AFTER-SCHOOL ACTIVITIES WE WERE INVOLVED IN WERE OUR “JOB,” AND WE WERE EXPECTED TO GIVE IT OUR ALL.

  With our children, I try to find the happy middle ground between how I was raised and Willie’s upbringing. We expect our kids to do well in school and they all do, but there are times when we just decide to stay home. I figure the school gives us fifteen days a year for a reason. We might as well take them. Also, I want our kids to learn several different skills so they can find the thing they are good at and that they love, but I don’t sign them up for quite as much as we did when I was a kid. I remember feeling like we were always on the go and just wanted to be home more at times. So I make sure our kids are involved in at least one sport, but the other lessons we try to space out so we don’t spend our afternoons in the car rushing from one event to the next. I like for them to have the time to just be home and to explore and sometimes even to be bored and learn to create their own adventures.

  When I was growing up in West Monroe, you technically didn’t start high school until you were in the tenth grade. The ninth grade was still considered a part of middle school back then. We attended a middle school out in the country, but then everybody moved up to West Monroe High School in the tenth grade. When I was getting ready to go to the tenth grade in 1987, though, they were in the process of building a new high school. All of the kids from my part of the parish were allowed to choose whether they wanted to start the school year at West Monroe or go to the new school that was called West Ouachita.

  Well, I decided to try out the new school since it was closer to home, and it seemed like the best choice. I went to the first day of school and checked in. I went to PE class on the first day, but we couldn’t play basketball because they still hadn’t put up the lights in the gymnasium. We had to sit there for an hour doing nothing. After about three days of sitting there, I said, “Screw this. I’m going to West Monroe High.” I realized I wanted to be in town anyway, so I just transferred schools during the first week of school.

  After about a month, the principal from West Ouachita called our house.

  “Willie hasn’t been to school for twenty-seven days,” the principal told Phil.

  “Well, he leaves for school every morning,” Phil told him. “I don’t know where he’s going. I thought he was going to school.”

  When I got home that day, Phil asked me where I had been.

  “School,” I told him.

  “WILLIE HASN’T BEEN TO SCHOOL FOR TWENTY-SEVEN DAYS,” THE PRINCIPAL TOLD PHIL.

  “Uh-uh,” Phil said. “The school called and said you haven’t been there in a month.”

  “Oh, yeah,” I told him. “I transferred to West Monroe. I don’t go to that school anymore.”

  “Okay,” Phil said. “I figured something was up.”

  Korie: Can you imagine a tenth-grader transferring schools without even notifying his parents? Willie just showed up at West Monroe High School and said, “Hey, I’m here.” He didn’t even think about telling Kay and Phil about transferring.

  When I got to high school, like most teens, I was becoming more and more social, so my entire objective was to get to town and stay there. Phil and Kay lived way out on the Ouachita River (they still live there today), and it’s about a twenty-minute drive into town. Once I went to town, I knew I wasn’t going home for a few days, because Phil and Kay never made a special trip to pick us up.

  We lived so far out of town that I rarely spent the night at home during the week during my high school years. I spent a lot of nights with my best friend, Paul Lewis, who is African-American, and his dad would cook all this weird stuff. I ate possum for the first time at Paul’s house. I started eating the meat on my plate, and I was like, “Oh, my goodness.” It had these tiny little legs. Paul’s daddy had shot a possum and just threw it on the grill. It was nasty. Paul’s daddy would also cook turtles and raccoons. You could bring him just about anything you killed, and he would cook it.

  I was running around town with Paul all the time. I think it’s safe to say I was the only white kid in his neighborhood. We were shooting basketball on the square one day, and a cop drove by and called me over to his police car. The cop asked me, “What are you doing over here? You don’t need to be in this neighborhood.”

  “I know everybody in this neighborhood,” I told him. “I practically live here.”

  Korie: By the time Willie was in high school, his parents pretty much just let him do his own thing. Willie slept wherever he could find a bed and meal. He even stayed at our house sometimes, which was fun. We were just friends at the time, so my parents didn’t have a problem with it. He’d stay with Paul and with Mike Kellett, our youth minister, quite a bit too. Because Willie’s parents’ house was so far out of town, he and his brothers fended for themselves and were really, really independent. Willie didn’t get his driver’s license till he was seventeen years old just because nobody took him. He never told us he didn’t have his license, though, and would drive my mom’s van sometimes when he stayed at our house. She didn’t find out till we were married that he didn’t have his license when he was driving her car. My dad about died!

  Even though Kay and Phil let us run around town in middle school and high school, I don’t think it was neglect or anything like that. Phil just never let anyone tell him what to do or how to do it, so I guess he figured we’d be the same way. He doesn’t believe in going by what the world says you “should” do to have a good life or to be successful. Phil’s philosophy was pretty simple: just follow what the Bible says and you’ll be all right. And for the most part, we did.

  PHIL’S PHILOSOPHY WAS PRETTY SIMPLE: JUST FOLLOW WHAT THE BIBLE SAYS AND YOU’LL BE ALL RIGHT. AND FOR THE MOST PART, WE DID.

  I think my life was also shaped in a big way by what Kay and Phil and Pa and Granny taught each of us at an early age: be content with what you have and don’t worry about what you don’t have. Even in the lean times, there was a lot of love and laughter in the house. Some of my best memories are from when we had nothing. Who says you can’t live on love? I think we did. We were thankful for what we had, comfortable with who we were, and always confident. We were Robertsons, for goodness’ sake! And that meant something. When I was younger, I never believed I was different from anyone else—even if we were receiving free lunches.

  WILLIE’S MEATLOAF

  Be creative on this one. I got my foundation for this out of The Joy of Cooking (which I go to all the time), then I started making stuff up. My only note on this: If the meat is full of grease, drain it. Check the meat while it is cooking. It’s tricky to drain but do it if you have to. Growing up I hated meatloaf, but this one I like.

  2 pounds ground beef

  1 pound andouille sausage

  2 cups white onion, diced

  1 clove garlic, minced

  11/2 cups bread crumbs, divided

  2/3 cup parsley flakes

  1 teaspoon oregano

  1 teaspoon thyme

  2 c
ups ketchup, divided

  1 15-ounce can tomato sauce

  4 eggs, beaten

  2 cups mozzarella cheese

  1 cup Parmesan cheese

  1 tablespoon Phil Robertson’s Cajun Style Seasoning

  1 teaspoon salt

  1 teaspoon pepper

  5 or 6 slices bacon

  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

  2. In a large cast-iron pot, combine ground beef, sausage, onion, garlic, 1 to 11/4 cups bread crumbs, parsley, oregano, thyme, 1 cup ketchup, tomato sauce, eggs, and mozzarella cheese. Use hands to thoroughly mix together.

  3. Smooth meat mix in bottom of pot.

  4. Cover meatloaf with Parmesan cheese, remaining bread crumbs, Cajun Style Seasoning, salt, and pepper.

  5. Top meatloaf with remaining cup of ketchup and bacon.

  6. Cook for 11/2 hours, until middle of meatloaf is no longer pink.

  5

  TOAST ’N’ PIZZA

  A FRIEND LOVES AT ALL TIMES, AND A BROTHER IS BORN FOR A TIME OF ADVERSITY.

  —PROVERBS 17:17

  When you watch Duck Dynasty, it might be pretty easy to see that Jase and I are very competitive. When we were younger, whether it was fishing, hunting, playing sports, or just about anything else, Jase and I loved a good competition. It wasn’t just against each other. We would challenge anybody, but since we were the closest in age and lived all the way down at the mouth of the river, a long drive from civilization, for the most part we were all we had. So competing against each other and, more important, beating each other (and then reminding the loser about the details of our victory afterward) became our favorite pastime. It was that way when we were kids, and it’s still that way today—whether it’s in business, duck hunting, fishing, or golf.