Live Oak police officer Sergeant Douglas Hohman attended the first Father-Daughter Dance right after getting off work with his friend’s daughter Maylee Gavey, 7.

LIVE OAK — Jimmy Norris recalls the exact moment he knew the Suwannee County Chamber of Commerce’s first Father-Daughter Dance was a success.

The Chamber wanted to give fathers and daughters a chance to connect and build a bond, and during the inaugural event, Norris — the Chamber’s executive director — knew it had accomplished that goal.

“We wanted to have a good, clean family event that would help dads and daughters kind of open those lines of communication,” Norris said Wednesday about the event. “We wanted something that was really going to help provide some good quality time between the dads and the daughters.

“One of the guys that attended told me that he heard us on the radio and he had been struggling to spend some time with his daughter. Heard it on the radio, came to the event and that night they were out there dancing, her head was resting there on his chest and he just looked at me and said ‘Thank you.’ That’s what we were trying to capture.”

The Chamber’s second Father-Daughter Dance is set for June 17 at the Suwannee County Coliseum. The dance is slated to last from 6 p.m. to 10 p.m. and will also feature a sit-down dinner this year, after offering just appetizers a year ago, according to Len Stapleton, who is in charge of the committee organizing the dance.

A limited number of tickets, which cost $25 and covers everything at the event, are available and can be purchased online or at the Chamber or at Celebrations, the event’s title sponsor who will also be decorating the event.

The idea to start the dance came from Travis Henry, the Chamber’s President.

Jeff Lee, a board member, was on board the moment he heard the Chamber was considering it. Lee had previously taken his two daughters, Sarah Beth and Georgia, to Father-Daughter dances in Valdosta in search of exactly what the Chamber was hoping to create here.

As far as Lee is concerned, that mission was accomplished.

“We had already been to several in Valdosta and they were a big success up there,” Lee said. “We saw the success that they had had and the popularity of it. It seems to bring the community together.

“These two didn’t want to go because of their age. They’re teenagers. But once they got there, they had a good time.”

“Yeah, it was fun,” Sarah Beth added.

As great as the first dance was, the Chamber is looking to make the encore performance even better.

It has added the sit-down meal which will be provided by 11th Street Kitchen. There will be more drawings throughout the night for both the daughters and the fathers to win. There are more balloons for the balloon drop and there will be a chocolate fountain in addition to a candy bar for all to treat their sweet tooth.

A photo booth will be provided once again with props and Tammy Johns will also be present to take formal photos to commemorate the event.

All in all, the Chamber is just wanting to make it a memorable event for all involved, no matter the age.

“We had six weeks to 50 years old basically daughters and then of course their dads last year,” Norris said.

Lee added: “You had 44-year-old women there, 50-year-old women there with their dad. That was kind of cool. You didn’t expect that. It’s not just daddy-daughter in terms of a young child or a teenager.”