Dalton's Catering

The first restaurant opened in 1962 by R. L. & Ida Belle Dalton, named Woody’s. There have been restaurants since, with the last two being Ember’s, which opened in 1972, and Dalton’s in 1990.
Bobby Dalton, my dad, opened Roman Gate in 1973, which was an Italian Restaurant, and then took Ember’s over in 1977, while Grandma and Granddaddy “retired,” although they were still there daily.

Daddy began pushing the catering business in the late ’70s. He had two banquet rooms that he kept occupied inside the restaurant and was also mobile with catering that included anything from factories, churches, and weddings. His most prominent and most challenging was the Sunbelt Expo. When I was about eight years old, I started helping him with the catering. I missed school the week of the EXPO to help him. We catered the Governor’s Luncheon, which would be about 1000 people with 3 to 4 buffet lines, the Exhibitor’s Lounge 4 days of the week, the Livestock Meeting one night of the week, the Exhibitor’s Breakfast one morning of the week along with anything else that Dr. White and Chip would come up with, not to mention, the restaurant, Ember’s, was still open for regular business. It was an “All hands-on deck” kind of week for sure. There was a day or two during the week of the Expo that we would feed about 2000 people for lunch between all of the places.