Dalton has always had a cultural side to it. Shortly after the Civil War, Dalton Little Theatre productions began, and now Dalton lays claim to the longest running community theater productions in the state.
Around the turn of the century there was famous poet Robert Loveman writing his immortal lines about daffodils, and Will Harben was working the prose side of the literary page, writing best-sellers about the folks of Northwest Georgia.
We’ve had movies since the silent days, medicine shows, vaudeville and chautauquas. With the growth of the carpet industry, Dalton got an influx of folks from around the country and even the world, and this cosmopolitan group were always looking for quality entertainments. The Creative Arts Guild was started in the early 1960s and played a big part in raising the bar on the high end of art. On a side note, the Guild is the oldest community arts organization in the state, giving us claims to fame for little theater and community arts. Take that, Atlanta and Savannah!
Big city performances
In the Town Crier’s ongoing research into our community and the people in it, I have just come across a program from the 1968-69 season for the Dalton Mutual Concert Association Concert Series, cosponsored by the Dalton Junior Woman’s Club. This series brought in big-city performances to our small but sophisticated town.
This was the sixth season of the series. The ladies put together this annual series to raise money for a series of charities that they identified as important. This may have been before the United Way took over the majority of charity fundraising in the community and it was also a time before some organization functions were handled by various government services. Let’s skim through the book and take a look at the high-end entertainment Dalton had going for it in that ’68-’69 season.
‘Dear Friends’
The program is really nice looking with a silver metallic paper for the cover. On the front is artwork of the smiling face of the “drama mask” and on the back is a line drawing of a conductor with baton in hand and a score in front of him. The silver paper really shows off his formal tuxedo. There is a letter of greeting from the president of the Dalton Junior Woman’s Club, Carol Broadrick. She writes to “Dear Friends” as she welcomes supporters to the concert series. She goes on to thank all the advertisers for their contributions that allowed the club to carry out their charity work and then lists many of the charities that the club supports. She then thanks the concert members for making the series possible.
The next page includes a photograph of eight of the club’s officers. In ’68, proper society listed the ladies via the husband’s name. Therefore we have Mrs. Stan Gardiner, Mrs. Fred Burns, Miss Carol Broadrick, Mrs. Evan Armstrong Jr., Mrs. Larry Meltz, Mrs. James Barnes, Mrs. John Avrett and Mrs. William McGaughey.
A couple of pages over is a photo of the six Dalton Mutual Concert Association Officers and then the Board of Directors list with Mrs. Sam Gunn as chairman, and plenty of Dalton names such as Abernathy, Bailey, Bandy, Broadrick, Davies, Farrow, Finney, Goodroe, Kemp, Lauman, Little, Looper, Moss, Posey, Shruptrine, Starr and Winkler. There are also members of the board from Calhoun, Chatsworth and Cohutta. There is a Patrons Page made up of 24 names, all of them doctors. Some of them were dentists and some veterinarians. The list included the names of Bowers, Burger, Dardin, Farrow, Felker, Gregory, Harder, Henson, Hogshead, James, Jones, Keown, Looper, Lusk, Mathews, McGhee, Oosterhoudt, Patterson, Raitz, Rogers, Rosen, Summerour, Tipton and Walker. Did you go to any of them when younger?
There were four performances. These included a Broadway-style musical play, Dixieland jazz, a dance troupe and a symphonic performance. The Broadway play, “Carnival,” would be performed Oct. 15, The Preservation Hall Jazz Band show was Jan. 27, 1969, the Jose Molina Bailes Espanoles, the Spanish dance troupe, performed on Feb. 12, and on April 15 you could forget your tax woes by seeing the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra in Dalton that night.
The program is 64 pages with the vast majority ads placed by sponsors. Some ads are full page, some are half page, some pages have three or four ads, some eight and some 16. There’s a handy index in the back so if you bought an ad you can look up your company name and see what page it was on.
Some of the ads just say “Compliments of a Friend.” Some ads are for entities as far away as Chattanooga, including a full page ad for Miller Brothers Department Store, and one from Rome Paper Co. since they had a local representative for Dalton sales and a weekly delivery sent to Dalton. That’s a far cry from the same-day delivery they have now for places like Atlanta. The big boy, full page ad buyers included Coronet Carpets, Celanese Fibers, Monsanto, Crown Tuft Carpet, the Tanatex Chemical Corp., the First National Bank of Dalton, Allied Chemical, E.T. Barwick Mills and Cabin Crafts West Point Pepperell.
There were two associations that took out ads in the program. The first was the Dalton Pharmaceutical Association and their 13 members. The members at that time were Bradley & Weaver, Broadrick, Collier, Dalton Drug, Dart Drugs, the Drug Shop, Dunaway Drug, Frank’s Pharmacy, Maret’s Prescription Shop, Owen Pharmacy, Professional, S&W and the Shackleford Drug Co.
The other association was the North Georgia Oil Co. Shell service station companies. These included places where you may have “filled ‘er up” including Maynard Young Shell, Tunnel Hill Shell, Triangle Service Station in Rocky Face, Shellmaster on Cuyler and Pentz, Lloyd’s Shell on 41 South, Plainview Shell on Cleveland Highway, Walnut Avenue Shell, Connector 3 Shell, Suttle Bros. on South Hamilton and Emory, Pinson Shell on Glenwood and Waugh, Brock’s on Morris and Fifth Ave., and Community Shell on 41 North. Some of these places are still standing but are no longer gas stations.
Supporting charities
The Dalton Junior Woman’s Club had charities it supported. The program actually had a budget for the club in it showing projected expenses and projected income. Dues and initiation fees were projected to bring in $660 and ad sales another $2,000. The June balance was $3,620.15, added to the income for the year’s budget, with the total budget coming to $6,280.15. The charity contributions were for such things as a South American foster child, Teen Town, Girl Scouts, Sheriff’s Boys Estate, a Christmas party for the underprivileged, Cancer Fund, Christmas Seals and Easter Seals, Cheerhaven, Tallulah Falls School and several other organizations. The big three were Cheerhaven with a $2,000 contribution, Teen Town with $1,000 and Tallulah Falls School with $393.75. The Girl Scouts got $200, the Salvation Army Camp $23 and the Cancer Fund and Easter Seals $5 each. These numbers seem quaintly modest these days.
Cheerhaven was a specialized local school for special needs students, whether physical or learning. This was before these students were integrated into the main school system.
Teen Town was a clubhouse-type gathering place for activities for the town’s teenagers to help keep them busy with positive activities. It would hold things like parties, dances and games there.
The Tallulah School was opened in 1909 by the Federation of Women’s Clubs in Georgia to help educate poor mountain kids. It remained in the hands of the Women’s Clubs until 1970. The Dalton Woman’s Club in addition to a direct donation to the school also contributed in ’68-’69 scholarship funds for a student and funds for another student to take summer classes there.
The small town with a big heart
The one thing not in the program is what ticket prices were. With the ad revenue, the ticket prices and membership fees, the organizations putting on the concert series brought in enough funds to pay for the four shows. I’d be curious to know what it cost to bring in these different acts back in 1968. How much did it cost for the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra to come to Dalton for one night, for example?
The other question I don’t have the answer to is what the ad rates were for the program. Was a full page ad super expensive? Did a 1/16 ad cost $5?
The important thing to know, however, is that Dalton could support these rather large groups to come in for performances, and that year after year the community came out for the shows. It was this kind of bonding that helped make Dalton the small town with a big heart it still is today.
Mark Hannah, a Dalton native, works in video and film production.