BRADY FLANIGANStaff Writer

Lions have been hunting in Tullahoma. On Thursday, August 15 a pride zeroed in on a target and laid hidden in the grass waiting to pounce. The incident took place at Damron’s Restaurant on East Lincoln Street at one p.m. The target was the owner. 

Gloria Damron was hard at work in the kitchen. The tables were full. Nobody expected her to be pulled from the kitchen and surrounded by Lions, but that’s what happened. In this special case though, they weren’t out for blood. They were out to give an award. These Lions were from the Tullahoma Downtown Lions Club, and they were there to surprise Gloria with a Melvin Jones Fellowship for her contributions to the club and the community. 

In 2019 Gloria co-founded the 501c3 non-profit Come To The Table. Every Tuesday Damron’s Restaurant offers a hot meal–meat, veggies, dessert, and tea–to anyone who wants one, free of cost. Since 2019 the organization has served more than 5000 hot meals to the city of Tullahoma. Gloria explained the idea’s simple origins, saying, “We were just talking about all the people who needed food, especially the kids in this area. There’s a lot of kids in the area who don’t have a hot meal, so we just opened our doors and started. We’ve had a great turnout, a lot of volunteers. We have a lot of children who need this over here.”.

Come To The Table’s first Tuesday saw a crowd of 19 people. Since then the project has only grown. Gloria mentioned that these days the crowd usually averages between 140 to 150 people. With the support of the community and the Tullahoma Downtown Lions Club, Gloria plans to keep serving meals to anyone that needs them. Being given a Melvin Jones Fellowship award is just a small token of the club’s appreciation for someone caring for their community.