Charlotte woman helped her mom grow popular uptown spot. ‘She was just fun to be around.’
Charlotte native Elizabeth “Beth” Davis spent a lifetime serving her community in the hospitality industry, which included helping her mother build the uptown staple McNinch House Restaurant.
Davis died Nov. 25 after several months of health problems. She was 66.
Family and friends remember Davis for being sweet — like her popular Blackberry cobbler served at the restaurant — with a heap of comfort, like her crab cakes.
The only child of Ellen Davis, owner of McNinch House Restaurant, Davis was her mother’s sidekick at the 30-year-old restaurant on the first floor of the purple 1892 Queen Anne-style home on North Church Street.
“We had the same ideas about what we were going to do. We made lists. Those lists got long,” her mother told The Charlotte Observer. “It was fun.”
Davis was McNinch House’s office manager, taking care of the bills and payroll. But she also filled in doing anything that needed to be done. She would prep food, make desserts, do the dishes, plant flowers outside, anything and everything, her mother said.
The mother-and-daughter duo made day trips and spent hours together shopping at local stores and flea markets, and online, for furniture and the china, silver and crystal table settings at McNinch House.
“She liked finding different shapes with flowers or decorations that could be used for soups, fun things to change it up a bit,” Ellen Davis said.
Davis also would find new recipes to try and was “meticulous” about chopping vegetables, her mother said.
‘Fun to be around’
Davis got her start in the restaurant business after graduating from Garinger High School by working for her aunt Ginny and uncle Joe Clark at Beauregard’s. The family sold the restaurant in 1997, but it’s still open on the west side of town.
“She loved bartending because it was fun and she got to talk to people,” her mother said.
Mitch Clark of Charlotte shared stories about the fun he and his cousin had while working there.
“Do you remember the TV show ‘Cheers?’ “ he asked. “It was just like that.”
Davis had a way of doing special things for people, like having a balloon at the ready for a customer’s child. “She was just fun to be around,” Clark said.
That even included being dragged to the theater to see horror movies, Clark said, which Davis loved.
“She wouldn’t go by herself. But halfway through the movie, we’d be holding hands. I’d ask why are we doing this?” he said. But Davis would always want to go again and he’d acquiesce.
Being five years younger, Clark said, “she always watched after me.”
‘Always there, with every moment’
That care spilled over to friends too, like Davis’ lifelong childhood friend Kim Schmitz. She even extended financial help to Schmitz’s parents when they needed it.
“Beth was always there, with every moment,” Schmitz said. “She could be so funny and in turn be a serious kind and caring person.”
As children, the two would talk at the backyard fence for hours and as teens, hang out at SouthPark mall. As adults, the friends would meet up for lunch to catch up at their spot at House of Pizza on Central Avenue.
But Schmitz said Davis’ taste for the food industry started early.
“She would invent sandwiches, sometimes it’d have everything but the kitchen sink,” Schmitz said. “But she’s always been able to create recipes and it be wonderful.”
Recipes make memories
This Christmas Eve, Schmitz will miss the longtime tradition when Davis would drop by with her homemade crab cakes.
“I’m going to be lost,” Schmitz said choking up. “She left a broken heart. There will never be another one to replace her.”
Davis leaves behind friends and family, including her father Richard Davis of Atlanta, plus recipe creations like her blackberry cobbler.
“That was one of her specialties. I’m going to make one soon,” her mother said.
Her niece Sydney, 19, added a line in her aunt’s obituary: “Beth, after a life devoted to serving others, your table is now ready.”
This story was originally published December 12, 2022 at 5:50 AM.