At 6 a.m. Tuesday, approximately 50 Boston butts will be placed into a traditional fire pit at Bubba Wolford’s home on the river before sunrise.

“They go in right at 6,” Bubba said. “And we’ll cook them into the night. You’ve got to stay with it all day – you can’t let it flame up.”

The Boston butts are being prepped by Bubba, Quinn Brislin and Will Sanders for St. Paul’s May Luncheon, scheduled Wednesday from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. Wolford cooks the barbecue in the same pit his father, the late Tom Wolford, and his father’s friend, the late Todd Gale, used.

“(The women of the church) did the chicken salad for years and years, and he was just looking to raise more money,” Bubba said of his father. “He wanted to add to it. He loved to cook, and so he said, ‘Let me do the barbecue side.’ Maybe we can pump up the money, pump up the sales.”

Originally, Tom prepared 25 butts. Now Bubba, Quinn and Will have added another 25, sold whole to honor Tom and Todd’s original idea.

“I remember one day at the 8 o’clock service, Tom told me, ‘Y’all next. Y’all better get ready, get down here and start helping us,’” Quinn said. “And Todd had said the same thing, and all of a sudden we lost both of them, so we had to step in there overnight.”

The Boston butts, cooked by a second-generation Wolford for the sixth year, are still a relatively new addition to the traditional boxed lunch offerings of chicken salad, crackers, potato salad, deviled eggs and a dessert.

Team effort and tradition

The May Luncheon, according to church records, is a 150-year tradition. Originally, the luncheon coincided with the Eighth of May Emancipation Celebration and was called the Eight O’ May Luncheon.

These days, in order not to conflict with Market Street Festival and Mississippi School of Mathematics and Science’s Eighth of May Emancipation Celebration, the luncheon is called simply “The May Luncheon.”

“It was a big deal back then,” said Pat Curtis, chair of the chicken cooking committee. “And it was always for the community. In other words, come to our church, we’ll give you a good meal, and it’s not going to be very expensive. And I think that’s still true.”

“And you’ll have fellowship,” added Marian Hazard, who chairs both the cooked dressing and chicken salad mixing committees.

Bridget Pieschel, who serves on the chicken chopping, egg mixing and bake sale bagging committees, said no part of the meal is unaccounted for, and that’s what makes it possible.

The roughly 100 volunteers who come together each year to form committees for each portion of the luncheon take their roles seriously. Every moment of preparation is broken down, including a celery-chopping committee – no food processors allowed – plus separate teams for cooking and chopping chicken.

There are cake icers for the 40 sheet cakes, and multiple deviled egg committees for what Bridget jokingly calls their “liturgically correct” deviled eggs – they’ve stuck to the same recipe since the beginning. The deviled egg someone eats in 2026 is the exact same deviled egg someone had in 1920.

Marian said she expects around 1,350 deviled eggs to come together when it’s all said and done.

And if coordinating nearly 650 plate lunches wasn’t enough, the congregation also comes together for the bake sale. There’s even a beautification committee that, Bridget said, takes all the donated baked goods and “wraps them and makes them pretty.”

While the funds raised by the luncheon go toward the church’s general fund and selected nonprofits, including its own food kitchen, proceeds from the bake sale go into a fund supporting the Episcopal Church Women’s Group’s selected nonprofits.

Past projects have included supporting Helping Hands, the Golden Triangle Regional Homeless Coalition and Loaves and Fishes.
Funds have also gone toward repairs for the church and its school. Six years ago, Pieschel said, the church used the funds raised to repair the organ, which was damaged by a lightning strike.

“It’s a fluid decision every year,” Pieschel said. “But the whole purpose of our May Luncheon is to send what we raise out into the community.”

A century and a half since its origins, St. Paul’s May Luncheon still brings the community together, linking past, present and future.
“It’s really rooted in tradition,” Pat said. “We make sure that the tradition is followed each and every year.”

“Oh, they’ll talk about you if you cut that celery wrong,” Marian added with a laugh.

Event details

The May Luncheon fundraiser is open to the community Wednesday. A bake sale featuring sweet and savory treats will be held from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, 318 College St.

Boxed lunches, with a choice of chicken salad or barbecue, are $15 each. The memorial sale for smoked Boston butts is $35.

The deadline to order boxed lunches is Monday. All orders may be picked up at the church between 11 a.m. and 1 p.m. Wednesday.

Orders can be placed at stpaulscolumbus.com or by scanning the QR code on event flyers. Payments may be made in advance online or at pickup via cash, check or card. For more information, call (662) 328-6673.