Town toasts Norville as fun-loving businessman

Published 6:04 am Friday, June 7, 2013

Ask a room full of friends and acquaintances about Dalton businessman Zack Norville and you’ll hear the phrase “he’s a character” more times than you can count.

His daughters talk about how he kept candy bars in the vegetable bins of their refrigerator growing up and let them be the flight crew for trips in his small planes.

Businessmen revere him for building Norville Industries 57 years ago, starting with a chicken house and the will to make it bigger and better. The Dalton-based company is a supplier to the floorcovering industry.

Pilots recount stories about him landing on Interstate 75 while it was under construction or taxiing down the roads of Dalton in his airplane to visit friends.

Stories abound.

When someone from the large Family Support Council committee that coordinates the annual Toast of the Town event suggested Norville as this year’s honoree, saying “yes” was an easy decision, said fundraising chairwoman Karen Townsend.

Norville was honored at The Farm Thursday evening as dozens of the area’s business and community leaders gathered for the 24th annual fundraiser. The Family Support Council works to prevent child abuse through various educational programs. Every year, the Toast of the Town honoree is “someone who has given back to the community in all different ways,” Townsend said.

Granddaughter Christina Amos said Norville’s personal petting zoo is always a draw. Years ago after a visit to the Incan ruins of Machu Picchu in Peru, family members said he began collecting exotic animals and allowing visitors to visit them. They said the endeavor on Dug Gap Road took off after he saw a bus carrying children with disabilities stop beside his farm and the children got out to see the animals.

“Every time we go (visit), there’s someone there looking at the animals,” Amos said.

Larry Weatherford said Norville is “such an individual.” Weatherford knew the Norville family when they still lived in Watkinsville in Oconee County where Norville’s mother taught school. Norville had relatively little money growing up, Weatherford said, but he had big plans.

He obtained a textile engineering degree from Georgia Tech, served in the Air Force for several years and toured the world after he was released, obtaining rides from country to country. Daughter Deborah Norville, who was the toast mistress for Thursday’s gathering, said she could remember as a little girl going to The Oakwood restaurant with her sisters and watching from a booth as her father and other businessmen sat at a table in the back and made deals. In those days especially, she said, that table was where the town’s business happened.

Daughter Cathy Amos said her father has always been good with math and could find the square root of any number without using a calculator. He could also dance like Fred Astaire, compete with race cars, ride motorcycles and generally have fun. One toaster recalled a time when a group of businessmen were riding to Lake Lanier for a strategic planning meeting. Most of them were complaining about having to drive in the pouring rain — until they saw Norville arrive on a motorcycle wearing rain gear.

“On a day like this,” he told them, “you have to make your own sunshine.”

Several family members gathered for the occasion including daughters Cathy Amos, Nancy Hallsworth, Deborah Norville and Patti Silvers along with Norville’s wife Rita, granddaughters Christina Amos, Beth Senkbeil and Stephanie Silvers, as well as son-in-law Phil Amos, grandson Zack Amos and special friend Johnny Thomas.

“It’s entirely appropriate (for Norville to be Toast of the Town) because for almost 60 years, Dalton has been the object of Daddy’s toast,” Deborah Norville said.