{"id":183332,"date":"2026-02-27T18:51:07","date_gmt":"2026-02-27T18:51:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/183332\/"},"modified":"2026-02-27T18:51:07","modified_gmt":"2026-02-27T18:51:07","slug":"dallas-restaurateur-ed-murph-owner-of-normas-cafe-dies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/183332\/","title":{"rendered":"Dallas restaurateur Ed Murph, owner of Norma’s Cafe, dies"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dallas restaurateur Edward “Ed” L. Murph III, owner of Dallas’ treasured home-cooking chain Norma’s Cafe<\/a>, passed away on Monday, February 23; he was 78.<\/p>\n

A statement from the Dallas chapter of the Texas Restaurant Association called him “a respected leader and cherished member of our restaurant community” who’d served as a former GDTRA President, Texas Restaurant Association State Board Member, and was a Hall of Honor Inductee.<\/p>\n

Murph was also the first-ever Texas recipient of the National Restaurant Association Restaurant Neighbor Award, reflecting his unwavering commitment to community service and leadership through Norma’s Cafe.<\/p>\n

“His impact on our industry and the countless lives he touched will not be forgotten,” the association said. “He was truly a great man who will be greatly missed.”<\/p>\n

One of Dallas’ oldest restaurants<\/a>, Norma\u2019s Cafe was originally opened in Oak Cliff in 1956 by namesake Norma Manis. Murph was a Dallas native who grew up in Oak Cliff and ate at the original location even into his days as a student at Adamson High School.<\/p>\n

He’d been in the hospitality industry since 1970, owning a series of clubs, bars, and restaurants, including Caf\u00e9 Cancun in the early 1980s.<\/p>\n

When he learned Norma’s was up for sale, he acquired it in 1986, seeing an opportunity to buy a restaurant that was not only a Dallas icon, but a place he enjoyed as a child. It became his legacy.<\/p>\n

“As a kid, my parents took me [to Norma\u2019s Cafe] to eat, and in high school it was the place to go to have French fries and a Coke, because that\u2019s all the money you had,\u201d Murph recalls on the restaurant’s website. \u201cIt\u2019s been around for so long that [it seems like] everybody in the world has eaten there.”<\/p>\n

Norma’s is the ultimate everyman restaurant, open for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, with signature dishes such as the \u201ceNORMAus\u201d chicken fried steak, fried chicken, fluffy biscuits & gravy, cornbread, and housemade “Mile-High Pies.”<\/p>\n

Murph went on to open four more locations \u2014 in Plano, Frisco, North Dallas, and Park Lane \u2014 as well as takeout operations<\/a> in Garland and Fairview. Each location became a destination for its neighborhood<\/a>.<\/p>\n

He also exhibited an uncommon sense of philanthropy, stepping up with many charitable overtures<\/a> during the pandemic, and continuing its epic annual tradition of serving a free turkey dinner on Thanksgiving Day to those in need.<\/p>\n

\u201cWorking people like to have breakfast and lunch,\u201d Murph told D Magazine in a 2017 story<\/a> about his passion for outfitting each location with period-era antiques that would match the profile of the food: lowkey, homestyle, and friendly.<\/p>\n

“It gives a feeling of comfort,” he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Dallas restaurateur Edward “Ed” L. Murph III, owner of Dallas’ treasured home-cooking chain Norma’s Cafe, passed away on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":183333,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[102,104,103,10912],"class_list":{"0":"post-183332","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-dallas","8":"tag-dallas","9":"tag-dallas-headlines","10":"tag-dallas-news","11":"tag-deaths"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/183332","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=183332"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/183332\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/183333"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=183332"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=183332"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=183332"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}