Ray Danner

     Raymond L. Danner Sr. was a prominent Nashville businessman who built Shoney's and Captain D's into a large national restaurant chains and who was active in philanthropy.
    Danner, who died in 2008 at the age of 83, was born in Louisville, Ky., and operated a variety of businesses, including a grocery store, a bowling alley and a drive-in theater before starting in restaurants.
     Danner began his restaurant career in the Madison section of Nashville as a franchisee of the Big Boy chain. He grew his business and eventually merged it with a company owned by Alex Schoenbaum of Charleston, W.Va., namesake of Shoney's. Shoney's became one of the nation's leading casual dining chains, but fell on hard times after Danner left the company in 1989. While in charge at Shoney's he founded Captain D's, a chain of fast-food seafood restaurants.
     Danner made charitable contributions through his Danner Foundation and was a founding donor of the Owen Graduate School of Management at Vanderbilt University.

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