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Bolton's |
| A Century-Old Pharmacy With a
Family Feeling |
| Years ago, a chocolate syrup salesman
stepped into Bolton's Pharmacy looking to make a deal with the
owner, Stephen C. Bolton. |
| "How many gallons do you
have?" the man asked Mr. Bolton, eager to sell him some new
stock for his pharmacy's popular soda fountain. Mr. Bolton, however,
was already known in the neighborhood for making his own chocolate
syrup from a recipe rich in cocoa. |
| "Oh, two or three," Mr. Bolton
replied. "But you can't make it as good as I can." |
| That wouldn't do. The man, Mr. Bolton
recounted recently, had to be shown. |
| "I said, 'Sit down,"' Mr.
Bolton said. "He tried some and said, "Let's talk about
something else." |
| If a business success grows from
longevity and name recognition, Bolton's, in the Hilltop Plaza, is
one of Watertown's most successful pharmacies. It celebrates its
100th anniversary this year steeped in tradition. |
| Like any longtime resident of the
neighborhood, Mr. Bolton thinks of the store as a family operation,
even though he sold it to his friend and colleague Robert C. Davis
eight years ago, and Mr. Davis has since sold it to a longtime
employee, Pat Signor, and her husband, Kevin. |
| Mr. Bolton took over the business from
his father, Stephen D. Bolton, in 1960, when it was near the Court
Street Bridge. The founder, Stephen C. Bolton, opened the store in
1985 down the street. |
| "I just got sucked into it,"
the founder's grandson said recently. "I got up, went to work
and went home." |
| It [Bolton's Pharmacy] survived
difficult changes in management. Stephen D. Bolton returned from
Europe during World War I to take over after his father died in a
car accident. One day in 1972, Stephen C. Bolton was found
unconscious on the floor, rushed to the hospital in a coma, and took
six months recovering. |
| In the meantime, Mr. Davis quit his job
at another drugstore to help at Bolton's. Mr. Davis later bought the
store, and in 1993 sold it to Mr. and Mrs. Signor. |
| Plenty has changed during the years.
When Mr. Bolton moved the store from 443 W. Main St, near the
bridge, to Hilltop Plaza in 1969, he gave up the chocolate syrup,
some of the homemade cough syrups and other remedies, along with the
soda fountain. |
| "When we moved, the soda fountain
stayed screwed tot he floor down there," Mr. Bolton said. |
| Despite tough competition from larger
chains, small pharmacies can survive if they pay close attention to
customers, Mrs. Signor said. Many of the store's customers have
shopped there for years, she said. |
| Doing a good job as a pharmacist these
days involves more than knowing about medicine, Mrs. Signor said.
"You have to be a bookkeeper and a psychologist." |
| In many cases, she said, customers are
surprisingly frank about their disabilities, which lets the pharmacy
build lasting relationships with customers. |
| In some cases, customers' ailments have
been plain enough to see. Several years ago, Mr. Bolton said, a
farmer came into the store, his soiled fingers stuck in a
half-clenched position. He couldn't pick anything up. |
| Mr. Bolton gave him a homemade hand
lotion |
| "I said, 'Before you go to bed,
wash your hands, get as much of the grime out as you can, use this
twice a day," Mr. Bolton said. |
| "Two weeks later, he came in like
this," Mr. Bolton said, wiggling his fingers in front of him. |
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| Bolton's Pharmacy is currently
remodeling the store on Hilltop Plaza. In order to do so, we are
tearing down what remains of the IGA. Here are some pictures of the
progress. |
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