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| News Article |
| Pharmacy and soda items will delight at A-OK auction |
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| By Eric C. Rodenberg
ABINGDON, Va. – Harold R. Ellis got his first job as a drug store soda jerk when he was 14 years old. He graduated from high school just in time to help the U.S. Marines take the island of Iwo Jima.
“He was somewhere on the island, as a member of the Third Marine Division, when they raised that flag,” his son, 59-year-old Doug Ellis, said.
After that, he returned home. He was at a loss as to what he would do. His sister said, “You will go to school to become a pharmacist. You know your way around a drug store.”
“My dad’s mother died when he was 12 years old,” Doug Ellis said. “So, he was raised by his older sister. My dad’s parents were dirt-poor old farmers. All we had was this farm, and most of it was a hillside here in the Appalachian foothills. When my dad took the G.I. Bill to go to college; it changed everything for us, as it did many families.
Harold found little argument with his sister’s sound advice. After graduating from pharmacy college at the University of Tennessee, he returned to Abingdon and opened Ellis Pharmacy in 1954 and managed it for the next 51 years. After his death in 2005, at the age of 79, his family operated Ellis Soda Shop and Grill for the next 10 years.
From the very beginning of their marriage, Harold and Yvonne Ellis collected not only for their store, but for the house. He collected pharmaceutical-related items. She bought Coca-Cola and country advertising items. The collections blended well together.
“People hated to see my mother show up at an auction,” Doug Ellis says. “If she wanted something, she was one of these people that was bound and determined to get it.
“My parents both loved history, but pharmacy items were of primary interest to my dad,” Doug recalls. “He worked in the days when the druggist did the compounding, the packaging and labeling of the bottles. Then, it was about more than counting pills.”
Harold would buy up old pharmacies throughout the area, if nothing, else but to preserve these professional relics. “He – or my mom – never bought with any intent to sell,” Doug says. “They used every piece, functionally or as decoration.”
On April 14-15, A-OK Auctions of Abingdon, in southwest Virginia, will be selling the contents of Ellis Pharmacy. “We’re finding all kinds of things,” according to Auctioneer Alan Shope with A-OK. “We’ve found at least 1,000 old bottles, including some rare “label under glass” jars, dating back to the late 1800s. There are all kinds of bottles, bitter bottles and some other rare pharmaceutical bottles.”
Not only do many of these items up for sale reflect Ellis’ 50 years in the business, but he was always buying other stores – many of which may have pre-dated his store.
At least two tiger oak apothecary showcase cabinets will be sold, both of which were originally from Bunting & Son Druggists in Bristol, Tenn.
“Dad would buy a lot of these stores completely out,” Dave Ellis says. “He would buy them, lock, stock and barrel.”
Among one of Harold Ellis’ prize possessions, according to Shope, was a set of unopened and unused apothecary jars. Each has a label under glass, and still have the original paper wrapped around the stoppers. They are in graduating sizes from 4 ½ to 8 inches.
“We believe these to date back to the late 1800s,” Shope says. “It seems like, in the old days, a pharmacist would have to buy his own bottles. That was the first thing they did after graduating. They’re all labels under glass, which was a real different process, especially how they made those bottles. I have never seen anything like this.”
Another rarity is a label under glass Lemon Kola syrup bottle. The bottle, in excellent condition, still has its cork, the remaining contents and a metal measuring cup. “These are not often seen, and our research only finds one other LUG (label under glass) syrup bottle selling for over $4,250,” Shope says.
Contact: (877) 963-0176
www.aokauctioncompany.com |
| 3/30/2018 |
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