Eat Arkansas

Lindsey’s Bar-B-Que the famed North Little Rock pit barbecue restaurant, open since 1956, has closed. son of original owner Bishop D.L. Lindsey (of the Church of God in Christ), weren’t reviving Lindsey’s Hospitality House in North Little Rock, with his father still overseeing the pit barbecuing and sauce. It'll reopen on Monday.

A bit of convoluted back-story: In 1975 Bishop Lindsey, who started Lindsey’s Bar-B-Que in his home on 203 E. 14th, decided to devote himself fully to the ministry and his family and sold the restaurant to his nephew Richard Lindsey (one of the North Little Rock Six who tried to integrate North Little Rock High two weeks before students integrated Central in 1957). After Rev. Lindsey’s children were grown, he got an itch to return to the restaurant business and, in 1989, opened Lindsey’s Hospitality House, 207 Curtis Sykes Dr. (East 15th Street), a home-cookin’ and barbecue restaurant, catering business and banquet hall that his son Donnie eventually took over. Last summer, as Donnie Lindsey prepared to open a Lindsey’s Hospitality House in Conway and transition the Hospitality House in North Little Rock to strictly a banquet hall, a fire destroyed the original Lindsey’s, and Donnie Lindsey offered the Hospitality House as a temporary home.

After a year in the Hospitality House, Richard and Eleanor Lindsey recently decided to shut down Lindsey’s Bar-B-Que. Richard Lindsey said a “number of things” factored into his decision to close, including delinquent sales tax payments and inflation.

Donnie Lindsey plans to offer the same barbecue meats as Lindsey’s Bar-B-Que along with home-style offerings like fried chicken, pinto beans and corn bread. The Hospitality House’s hours will be 11 a.m.-6 p.m., Mon.-Sat. The phone number is 505-8085.