Comments on: Dwarf Restaurant and Tate Motel - Really Found

By: Charlene Gambill

Charlene Gambill — Thu, 12 Oct 2006 04:00:42 +0000

Daddy had purchased a restaurant in Oak Ridge and had a contest offering a monetary prize to the person who’s name he chose for the name of the restaurant. The exterior of the restaurant was white. The person winning the contest wanted the restaurant to be called The Snow White because the place was white and sparkly clean. After the Snow White Daddy purchased other places and started calling them the Dwarf restaurants. He once told me he had hoped to have 7 Dwarf restaurants. He actually had 5; the one on Western Ave, 2 on Clinton Highway, one in Maryville, TN, and one in Gatlinburg. He had 3 other restaurants —-but they were not called the Dwarf. There was an Orange Julius in Fountain City, a restaurnat on Kingston Pike and another place on 411 hwy in Maryville. Daddy was renting these business and the contract would not let him change the names. Daddy never served any alcohol in his places of business. They were “family” restaurants offering home cooked meats and veggies and desserts. The restauarants were known for Daddy’s wonderful biscuits and chicken and dumplings. Many of the vegetables served were grown on our farm in Powell, TN and later on the farm in Friendsville, TN. He had customers from all over the US that returned annually when on vacation. Daddy always was hands on and made it a point to work his way around the dining rooms and talk to customers and learn who they were and where they were from. His customers loved him and his cooking. Most of the staff at the restaurants were family and friends. Many of my friends worked and paid their way in college with wages earned at the Dwarfs, including my husband-a UT graduate.

By: Swanky

Swanky — Wed, 11 Oct 2006 01:39:17 +0000

Charlene,
The first thing I want to know is, why the name? Did it have a relation to Snow White or what?

By: Charlene Sparks Gambill

Charlene Sparks Gambill — Wed, 11 Oct 2006 01:18:34 +0000

I am one of the daughters of John B and Marguerite Sparks, owners of the Dwarf Restaurants. I would be pleased to communicate with anyone interested in these family restaurants of days gone by. I have many fond memories of my fellow workers, customers and family members there. Please let me know anything you’d like to learn more about. Sadly my father passed away in 1988. My mother and her 4 daughters are all still in Tennessee, most of them around Maryville, TN, home of one of the several Dwarf restaurants our father and mother owned and operated around the Knoxville area from the 50’s and into the early 80’s.

By: Ricky

Ricky — Tue, 22 Aug 2006 03:39:15 +0000

Exquisite. Have not seen these images in years and what a refreshing visit to recall these buildlings from my childhood (and I am not THAT old)!! Excellent and exciting info. I was at a postcard show last year and saw the lovely old Country Squire Motel….should be shot for not buying it but oh well there was that one, probably others. ….excellent signage and the overall was done in tasteful and highly unusual for the time stark black and stark white. Very suave very tasteful for at the time rural field-laden Kingston Pike. :) Great work Swanky!

By: Swanky

Swanky — Fri, 11 Aug 2006 17:20:59 +0000

Cool. I emailed them for some info. My goal is to turn my collections into websites. I started collecting Knoxville postcards and now I mainly search Ebay for new places and images. I am trying to document these things while they are still here and get a bit of history. It is a huge task. Just in little ol’ Knoxville there are maybe 1000 postcards to document. I’d love to have the time and resources to branch out to other cities. It’s just too much work when I am nowhere near done with this town!

By: johnny dollar

johnny dollar — Fri, 11 Aug 2006 16:55:33 +0000

swanky - i really dig your urban archaeology efforts. are you a member of society for commercial archaeology? you should be, it is totally in line with what you look for. their site is http://www.sca-roadside.org/