The Enduring Legacy of Oakland’s Everett & Jones Barbeque ● UPDATING

For Dorcia White, growing up in the barbecue business meant that her friends rarely invited her to cookouts. They assumed she was tired of being around pitmasters, given that her family runs the legendary Everett & Jones Barbeque chain in Oakland.

But at Roberts Park in the Oakland Hills, White found freedom—a chance to be a kid without the responsibility of work.

Barbecue runs deep in the Everett family's veins, connecting a history of joy and struggle that began in Alabama and continued through the Great Migration to Oakland. The family's journey, from walking barefoot to school in the South to opening their first shop along what is now International Boulevard in East Oakland, culminated in a cookout celebrating Barack Obama's election as America's first Black president.

For the Everett & Jones family, a cookout is not just a celebration; it is their mode of operation. White, who owns the downtown Oakland location, credits her grandmother, Dorothy Turner Everett, with instilling values of family, tradition, and community in each generation.

These principles have kept the restaurant a cultural fixture even as other barbecue family businesses have closed or relocated.

White began working for the family at 14. She recalls sitting in class at Skyline High School when someone said, "I smell barbecue." She knew it was her, but she kept quiet.

"I knew I had barbecue in my pores," she said.

Before becoming a Bay Area barbecue standard, the Everett family lived in Mississippi, near the Alabama border. A family photo from around 1948-1949, displayed in every Everett & Jones location, shows the family outside a schoolhouse in Westpoint, Alabama.

The children are barefoot, the boys in overalls and the girls in white dresses. Dorothy Everett, then about 16, would become the family's matriarch.

The family moved to Oakland in 1952 when White's grandfather got a job on the railroad. They were part of the "Great Migration" of Black families from the Jim Crow South, drawn by jobs in Oakland's shipyards and maritime industries after World War II.

The U.S. Census Bureau noted in 1948 that such a massive internal population movement was unprecedented.

When families opened barbecue joints in the 1960s, their regional recipes—like Creole-spiced Jenkins' Original BBQ or Kansas City's brown-sugar sweetness—stayed. Both have since closed.

White notes that her grandmother worked at Jenkins and Flint's Barbecue before opening her own restaurant.

After her husband left, Dorothy Everett was left to raise nine children. Using her knowledge of the local barbecue industry, she secured a $700 loan from a friend and opened Everett & Jones Barbeque in 1973.

"It was rooted in a woman just really wanting to take care of her children," White said.

The restaurant's main draw was Everett's Special 'Que Sauce, a tangy, savory tomato-based sauce that blended influences from the barbecue joints where Everett had worked. It became a truly original Bay Area creation.

Everett & Jones' brisket cooks for 15 to 17 hours, ribs for 5 to 7 hours, and chicken less. The meats rotate on an automated rotisserie grill smoked with oak wood, the same wood Everett used when she opened her first shop on International Boulevard.

"It's not a fast process," White said. "Like a really good relationship takes time.

Slow, steady—that makes good barbecue."

The Broadway location includes a "juke joint" decorated with recycled doors and window frames from Victorian homes in West Oakland. Portraits of Bay Area celebrities line the walls, including Dorothy King, the family's matriarch who died in 2021.

Photos show Golden State Warriors stars Steph Curry and Kevin Durant with King. Concert posters from the restaurant's "Barbecue, Beer and Blues" festival feature artists like Little Milton and Bobby Womack.

A wall is dedicated to the Raiders' golden era.

One of the restaurant's most memorable cookouts was election night, November 4, 2008. Throughout the campaign, Everett & Jones served as an organizing hub for the Obama campaign in the East Bay, hosting Young Democrats, phone banking, and debate watch parties.

When networks announced Obama's victory, the celebration spilled into the streets of Jack London Square and downtown Oakland, creating a spontaneous block party under news and police helicopters. White watched from her home in West Oakland, caring for her newborn son.

Now, in the fourth generation, White's son has also started working at Everett & Jones. This is rare in 2026, as many historic barbecue joints in the region have closed.

Chinise Braviel, manager of the Laurel District location, attributes the closures to the pandemic and soaring beef prices. "I remember going to Flint's, going to Kinder's, going to KC BBQ," Braviel said.

"Now, we're like the 'Last of the Mohicans.'"

Despite the Raiders and Athletics leaving Oakland and gentrification changing neighborhoods, the soul of Oakland's barbecue endures. "We've been here a long time, and we didn't get here by imaginary things," White said.

"It's real, built on love, soul, community, and you can't bottle that up and make it a social media post."