Ralph Ketner

Ketner received the Ally Award from the LGBTQ advocacy group, Salisbury Pride, in 2015 and was a long time supporter of Alliance for Full Acceptance in Charleston, South Carolina.

In August 2015, North Carolina Governor Pat McCrory, a 1978 graduate of Catawba College, honored Ketner by naming him the recipient of the Order of the Long Leaf Pine, the state’s highest civilian honor. This took place at the premiere of Ketner's documentary “Lessons in Leadership,” which was "produced through a partnership between Food Lion and Catawba College, documents fully the business life and philosophy of Ketner, who once presided over the fastest-growing grocery company in America."

In 2012, Ketner received the Wilson L. Smith Philanthropic Award from the Rowan Regional Medical Center Foundation (now known as the Novant Health Foundation Rowan Medical Center).

In 1992, the North Carolina Chamber of Commerce, formerly known as the North Carolina Citizens for Business and Industry, bestowed Ketner with the award for Distinguished Citizenship for his "work as an outstanding entrepreneur, philanthropist, and civic volunteer."

In 1990, Ketner was inducted into the North Carolina Business Hall of Fame as a laureate.

After retiring from Food Lion, Ketner engaged in many philanthropic activities in areas ranging from higher education, to housing, homelessness, children and hunger relief. In 1989, he provided half the funds and raised the other half necessary to build Rowan Helping Ministries first building, which was completed in 1989. On Ketner's 94th birthday, he donated $94,000 to Rowan Helping Ministries.

On December 11, 1957, Ralph Ketner, Brown Ketner, and Wilson Smith co-founded the Food Town (later Food Lion) grocery store chain in Salisbury, North Carolina. Ketner served as President (later CEO, Chairman, and Chairman Emeritus).

Returning home after leaving Tri-State College, he worked at Cannon Mills as an accountant, eventually rising to the position of auditor. After the Attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, Ketner volunteered and joined the U.S. Army, serving in Africa and Europe for 36 months.

In 1937, Ketner graduated from Boyden High School and went on to attend Tri-State College (now Trine University) in Angola, Indiana as an accounting major. He excelled in his accounting and business law classes, but ran out of money and kept dropping out of a required public speaking course. Thanks to Toastmasters, he was eventually able to cope with his fear of public speaking.

Ralph Wright Ketner (September 20, 1920 – May 29, 2016) was an American businessman and philanthropist. He was the founder of Food Lion (which was founded as Food Town) in 1957.

Ketner was born in Rimertown, North Carolina on September 20, 1920 to parents George Robert Ketner and Effie Yost Ketner. Ketner grew up selling newspapers and almanacs, all while learning what he called "street smarts". At a young age, Ketner had an apparent aptitude for arithmetic, claiming he could "out add any adding machine." As a teenager, Ketner worked at his brother Glen Ketner's grocery store located in Kannapolis, North Carolina.