Om June 9, 1983, the aged Peerless Drug Retail store, a landmark in Brownwood’s previous closed its doors.
This building is found at 300 N. Heart St. There is Point out Farm Insurance office now in the creating.
The making which housed the drug store has been in existence due to the fact the 1870’s and has served not only as a drug keep, but a publish office environment, home furniture shop, and a women’s ready-to-use enterprise, and other matters.
M. J. Coggin and S. R. Coggin created the historic building, and, at a single time the Brownwood Bulletin was housed on the 2nd flooring. The developing was long made use of and will be remembered as a drug retail outlet. The Ehrke Chiropractors also occupied the developing for quite a few many years. As a result of the a long time, the Camp family members operated Peerless Drug Keep, commencing with D. S. Camp Sr., then D. S. Camp, Jr., adopted by D. S. Camp III,. The drug keep stayed in the identical spot, thrived, and was very a great deal a part of the heartbeat of the city.
David Camp III eventually bought the shop to Eddie and Donna Knight, and they operated it for three decades. The drug retail outlet continued to provide the people of Brownwood right until June 9, 1983 when the Knights marketed the developing to the Southwest Point out Bank.
Larry La Roque, vice president of the lender, said that the stock from the keep was offered and all fixtures, which include the soda fountain, ended up bought. Right after that, the creating itself was bought. La Roque reported the bank did not take into consideration promoting it to anyone who would have it wrecked. Due to the fact of its historic significance, historical restoration-finance plans were being available for the building’s restoration. To the individuals of this spot, the building is a landmark.
When Camp, retired, he lived with his spouse and children at a ranch just off Park Road 15 in north Brown County. Genuine to the previous tradition, he saved on devoting at the very least element of his existence to the pharmaceutical environment. He was a reduction pharmacist at Campbell’s Pharmacy in Coleman. He located the identify a coincidence,. Truly, the Outdated Peerless Drug was an off-shoot of the Old Camp-Bell Drug Store.
Camp explained that the keep began with Camp and Shropshire in 1897. The two authentic associates in the Camp-Bell Drug shop have been D. S. Camp Sr. and A. H. Bell. The drug shop transformed palms as a result of the decades, but the Camps ended up often aspect of it and in the late 1970s David Camp III was sole operator.
When the Knights acquired the business, Jack and Larry Ehrke acquired the other fifty percent of the developing wherever the outdated Carl Derrick Cafe was located.
All prescriptions from Peerless Drug Store have been sold to Winn Pharmacy. The health-related historical past of numerous, numerous, Brownwood inhabitants could be gleaned from the five million or extra prescriptions in the Winn Pharmacy information. Camp stated that he and his father at Peerless experienced crammed 1,750,000 prescriptions at Peerless. “We had bought the Renfroe prescriptions when they shut their keep which represents 1.5 million prescriptions, he reported.
Among the accounts acquired by Winn Pharmacy were all the old Camp and Shrophsire, and the Camp
Bell Drug retailer prescriptions, as nicely as all the prescriptions from all of the Renfroe stores in Brownwood, Camp claimed.
Also amid the prescriptions information that went to Winn’s were being the aged Childress, JRB prescription documents. All these in addition the outdated Hallum Drug Shop prescription information, by now at Winn Pharmacy may well have totalled in excess of 5 million,.
Both Camp and Roland Winn supplied these documents to the College of Texas College of Pharmacy.
Just one factor that was unfortunately missed was the previous Peerless soda fountain. The fountain,was a accumulating area for young children,and was identified for thick milk shakes. In its early a long time, the drug retailer was a hangout for the registered nurse candidates from Dr. Daugherity’s healthcare facility found down the road a several blocks. Several Brown County inhabitants met their potential spouses there. The scholar nurses would drop in for the duration of the evenings and some of them later on married fellas they met at the drug retail outlet. Some that Camp remembered had been Bill Moore, C. Q. Davis, Cutter Cunningham, Cullen Johnson and Myron Embry.
The Peerless Soda fountain generally had 14 trays exterior for suppress service, Through Prohibition people managed to circumvent the legislation by obtaining whisky prescriptions for healthcare applications When the practice turned alternatively way too rampant and rather questionable, Camp’s uncle, grandfather and father solved that challenge by not renewing their alcoholic license. They did not truly have to have the organization, and it interfered with the common prescription business enterprise anyway.”
Camp remembers that as a result of the a long time the soda fountain made available quite a few a position to Howard Payne and Daniel Baker pupils.
Also even the shoe shine boys are a element of the drug store’s record.
A relief pharmacist the drug retailer experienced was Seth Thomson, who gave the shop his ti,r after he retired from Parke Davis and Co. soon after serving close to 40 a long time on the street.
David Camp III was born and raised in Brownwood graduated from Brownwood Large College in 1947. He attended Howard Payne College for two yrs and graduated from the University of Texas at Austin with a Bachelor’s diploma in pharmacy in 195
