The Duck Commander Family (11 page)

When we were growing up with nothing more than an idea in Dad’s head for a duck call that sounded exactly like a duck, folks would sometimes look at us with pity and wonder why Dad didn’t shave his beard and get a regular job. Some would
even poke fun at us. We made it through some really tough times. We were a lot like that roadkill. Most people just saw a dead, stinky animal that had the bad luck to run out in front of the wrong vehicle. But when we saw roadkill, we saw something that could catch a sackful of crawfish. We saw potential in the most unlikely places!

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T
HAT IS WHY A MAN LEAVES HIS FATHER AND MOTHER AND IS UNITED TO HIS WIFE, AND THEY BECOME ONE FLESH.

G
ENESIS
2:24

G
rowing up in the Robertson house, you never had much space or time for yourself. Our house had only two bedrooms, so I shared a room with Alan and Jase for most of my childhood. And then Jep came along, and it was just too crowded. I started looking for other places to sleep, where I wouldn’t feel like I was packed in like a sardine.

When I was in middle school, I moved into the cook shack in front of our house, which was screened in at the time. It was during the summer so it wasn’t cold, and it had a sink, which was really cool. I had a hot plate out there and cooked my own meals. I even moved into the building where we made the reeds for the duck calls. Neither of these places was very big and they didn’t have any insulation, heat, or air-conditioning. They weren’t exactly the lap of luxury, but for me, they were mine. And for some reason I always felt like I needed my own space.

Korie:
I always thought it was cool that Willie was trying to make his own little place in the world. He liked to fix up his space and paint it. He was a big baseball fan and loved the Los Angeles Dodgers. When he moved into the cook shack, he painted it Dodger blue. Even though it wasn’t much, Willie always tried to make it as nice as he could. He put pictures on the walls and would add his own little touches. He tried to have a nice little place to live. I’ve always been impressed by his ingenuity.

After a while, I figured out I needed to live in a place that was actually attached to the house, so I moved into a small back room that was our laundry room. Korie showed me the laundry room when I visited her house for the first time. I asked her, “Who lives in here? Man, you could fit a double bed in here!”

Korie:
I met Willie for the first time when we were in the third grade at Camp Ch-Yo-Ca, the camp I grew up at. Willie and Jase went to my session of the camp, and Alan came for high school week. Kay was cooking in the kitchen that summer, so her boys could attend the camp for free. I remember thinking Willie was the cutest thing I had ever seen and was so funny. We called him by his middle name, Jess, at the time. He had these big dimples and the cutest sideways smile. I had a diary that I never really wrote in, but that summer, I wrote: “I met a boy at summer camp and he was so cute. He asked me on the moonlight hike and I said ‘yes’!” I
even wrote “Korie Loves Jess” on the bunk of the cabin I was staying in that summer.

Yes, Willie asked me to go on the moonlight hike with him. It was always a big deal every summer figuring out which boy was going to ask you to accompany him on the moonlight hike, and I was thrilled when he asked me! Willie was definitely my first crush. After camp that summer, I didn’t see Willie for a couple of years. We went to different schools and his family went to a small church out in the country. Our family attended one of the bigger churches in town, White’s Ferry Road Church.

When I was in the fifth grade, Ray Melton, the preacher at our church, tried to recruit Phil to start coming to White’s Ferry Road. Ray’s daughter, Rachel, and I were best friends, and they were going to Phil’s house for dinner one night. They invited me to go along. I still remembered Willie from camp, so needless to say, I was just dying to go. I begged my parents to let me go with them. They said yes! I even remember what I wore to Willie’s house—a black top with fluorescent green earrings. Don’t judge . . . it was the eighties.

When Rachel and I got to the Robertsons’ house, the first thing Phil said to us was: “Have you met my boys, Jason Silas and Willie Jess? They’ll make good husbands someday. They’re good hunters and fishermen.” I was so nervous. I could not believe this was happening. The other thing I remember about walking in their home was that Phil and Kay had a sign on their door that said, “Honeymoon
in progress.” Phil and Kay have never been shy about their honeymooning . . . another thing that shocked me about their family.

Once we had eaten, Willie took us back to his room, which was actually the laundry room. He made us laugh the whole time. He would stick his thumb in his mouth and pretend that he was blowing up his muscles. He did acupressure tricks and showed us our pressure points. This was all very impressive to a couple of fifth-grade girls.

After a while, I decided I was going to try to really impress Korie. I started punching the tiles on the ceiling of the laundry room, which was a trick one of my buddies taught me. I’d rear back and just punch my fist through the ceiling and busted tile would fall over onto the floor. I’m sure she was really impressed.

Korie:
After leaving Willie’s house, I didn’t see him for another two years. In the seventh grade, Phil and Kay finally decided to move the family to our church. Willie called me on the telephone while I was babysitting some of my cousins. We didn’t have cell phones at the time, but he had called my house and my mom gave him the number to my aunt’s house. He told me they were going to start coming to our church. I was so excited. Willie asked me where I was going to go to college, and I told him I was going to Harding University. Willie thought I said Harvard and told Phil I was going to an Ivy League school. Phil told him: “That’s big-time, son.”

When the Robertson boys came to our church, everyone was excited because Jase and Willie were definitely the cool new guys. They ended up having a huge influence in our youth group, baptizing nearly a hundred teenagers over the next couple of years. It was incredible. There was tremendous growth in our youth group after they joined our church. Of course, all the girls liked Willie and thought he was cute. I think he dated about every girl in the youth group at one time or another.

One time Willie was dating one of my friends and we were riding on the bus during one of our youth trips, and Willie’s girlfriend gave him money to buy her a drink at a gas station. He came back on the bus with a pack of baseball cards and didn’t even buy his girlfriend a drink. I remember it made me so mad. I told my friend, “You should break up with him right now.” We all thought he was the worst boyfriend ever for doing that!

I’ll never forget the first time Willie asked me out. We liked each other off and on through middle school and high school, but we didn’t attend the same schools so we never really dated. He was attending West Monroe High School, and I was going to Ouachita Christian School, which is where Phil used to teach. When I was in the eleventh grade (Willie was a year older), he sent one of his friends, Jimmy Jenkins, to ask me out for him. Willie was pretty cocky and all the girls in the youth group were dying to go out with him. But I remembered how he treated my friend, so I told him no. It was a big blow
for him, but he needed to be knocked down a few notches. We both continued dating other people over the next year but then were both single around Christmastime during my senior year in 1990.