‘On the front lines’: KC meat cutter, an essential worker, takes risks to feed public
The stretch of Independence Avenue outside Snyder’s Supermarket in northeast Kansas City is usually busy, but on a recent weekday, hardly anyone was on the street.
Pandemic and stay-at-home laws are the order of the day. But while much of the public is asked to stay safe in their houses and work from home if possible, some workers — firefighters, nurses and grocery store clerks — are deemed essential. They continue to clock in each day despite the dangers, and places like Snyder’s Supermarket remain open for business.
Inside, store manager Jennelle James pointed to Hulbert “Skeet” Morgan, 61, as a worker who sacrifices to stay on the job, helping make sure people in the neighborhood can get food to put on the table.
“He’s risking coming to work,” James said.
Morgan, a mask on his face for safety, loaded steaks and pork chops into meat refrigerators while chatting with customers about the coronavirus — not using the word, but talking around the fear.
A bus station is close to the store, so Morgan doesn’t always know where customers have come from. Sometimes people walk into the store in groups. That’s when he retreats to the back of the store.
“That’s the only thing that’s scary,” Morgan said. “Then they’re talking about the next two are going to be the deadliest two weeks.”
Still, Morgan takes care of his customers and makes sure his meat counter is in order.
“I’m still here, serving the public,” Morgan said.
Across the Kansas City region, more than 1,000 people have fallen sick and about 40 have died as of Friday. At least 95 have died in Missouri, where there were more than 3,700 cases, and 50 have died in Kansas, where there were more than 1,100 cases.
Dozens of the more than 420,000 people infected in America worked in grocery stores or supermarkets. At least a handful have been among the more than 14,700 deaths across the country.
Dan Shaul, state director of the Missouri Grocers Association, said grocery stores workers take that risk each day. Unlike people who can work from home, they are away from their loved ones and may be working longer hours than usual, he said.
“They’re out there on the front lines,” Shaul said.
A Kansas City native, Morgan started in the food business when he was 11 at a small market that once stood at East 43rd Street and Indiana Avenue. He has been cutting meat across the city for more than 40 years, a skill he began honing at 17.
When the pandemic first began, it was hard for Morgan to get all of the same meat he used to. It was similar to rolling dice, he said — “a crap shoot.” He didn’t know what all he was getting until it came off the truck.
Things seem to be getting better now. Morgan said he is doing his best to keep his meat counter look as it did before COVID-19. If he can’t get a certain meat from one place, he’ll ask another. He pointed out, proudly, that some of the multinational retail corporations don’t have their own, in-house meat cutters. Most of their products are frozen or flown in, he said.
“I cut meat everyday,” Morgan said. “I’m trying to give the customers what they want.”
As the stocked his counter the other day, Morgan asked a customer how he was doing. He said he had caught a cold.
“You better stay out of here with that,” Morgan responded. “You need to get a mask on.”
When he’s not at Snyder’s, Morgan cares for his girlfriend of about 35 years. They’ve been together “forever,” he said, though they’re not legally married.
After a brain aneurysm in 2007, she stayed at a nursing facility in Grandview. But it wasn’t working out, so she now attends an adult daycare in Kansas City six days a week. She’s home Sundays, Morgan said, so they eat a big breakfast then.
“I believe if the shoe was on the other foot, she would take care of me,” he said.
Morgan is thankful the adult daycare, where staff take his girlfriend’s temperature each day, remained open while some businesses shut their doors.
Had it closed, he wouldn’t be able to work, which would have affected customers who depend on him for their meat.
“People got to eat,” he said. “I do know that.”
Star reporter Anna Spoerre contributed to this report.
This story was originally published April 11, 2020 at 5:00 AM.
