The Times - Serving Waitsburg, Dayton and the Touchet Valley

DAYTON—Steve’s Grocery on Fourth Street in Dayton has always been a unique gathering place, a neighborhood market where you can grab a gallon of milk, a Hermiston watermelon, a Christmas tree, or an ice-cold beer straight from the cooler. It even housed a little free library back in the ‘70s. The store’s original owner, Gail Bennett, had a shelf in the back of the store right by that beer cooler with the watermelons where customers could exchange books. “That shelf turned into a room of books, so we had to stop doing it,” said his daughter and the store’s current owner TJ (Tam...