Cookeville Father Daughter Date Night Tickets On Sale In Hours

One of Cookeville’s hottest tickets of the year goes on sale Saturday morning, tickets for Cookeville Leisure Services Father-Daughter Date Night.

Leisure Services Recreation Superintendent Cara Sheets said the tickets sell out quickly every year. She said this is a great event for daughters to carve out memories and traditions with their fathers.

“I just think it’s a special time,” Sheets said. “It’s an important role model to have, is to have that father figure, and I always like to see it. I love going to the event, obviously, and get to be first hand and see all of the experiences happening.”

Sheets said popularity has grown exponentially since it began in the late 1980s. She said the event is now four nights, February 16-17, and the following weekend. Tickets go on sale Saturday at 8am.

Each night of the event will include a catered dinner at Leslie Town Centre and, of course, the fan-favorite chocolate fountain. Tickets can be purchased for $40 on the Cookeville Leisure Services website.

“It’s very rewarding,” Sheets said. “That’s probably one of the best things like I said, is to have a front-row seat to all of these things. Most of the mothers, they’re not there with their dads, so they don’t get to see all of this, so it’s really neat to be in our shoes, the people who work the event, to get to see this.”

Sheets said when she began with the department in 2000, she used to have her father drive from out of town to attend the event with her. She said long-time Leisure Services Recreation Programmer Mildred Garrett started the event in the 1980s as a means of spending meaningful time with her own father. Just a one-night event for decades after it began, popularity has skyrocketed.

“We have an opportunity to take pictures upstairs, we serve dinner, there’s a big meal, and once dinner is over, we clear out the dance floor and the dads and daughters are able to dance the night away,” Sheets said.