According to the Encyclopedia of Cleveland History, the chain was founded in Cleveland in 1912. By the mid-1930s, there were 29 stores in the chain, which was known as Weinberger Drug Stores, Inc. By 1945, the stores acquired the Gray Drug name. The chain was greatly expanded in the late 1960s, swallowed up Cunningham Drug Stores in 1982, and at one point numbered more than 360 stores.
Gray Drug was sold to Rite Aid Corp. in 1987.
Locally, there just weren't all that many Gray Drug stores. There was one out at the O'Neil - Sheffield Center when it opened in 1954. But at the time of the ad below, which appeared in the Journal back on July 6, 1972, there were only two: one at Midway Mall and one at Oakwood Shopping Center.
It's an odd ad, with its curious "Lucky Buck" theme highlighting an odd assortment of items for a dollar, including playing cards, pencils, cigars, Planters Peanuts, flea and tick spray, Whitman candies, and even a few health and beauty products.
Hey, there's even some Bowman Ice Cream in there too!
I imagine there's not too many feelings of nostalgia for Gray Drug. Before Gray Drug and the other chains arrived, we all had our family pharmacies that we favored, such as Whalen Drug or National Pharmacy. Ironically, Rite Aid is probably my least favorite drug store.
Today, I prefer Discount Drug Mart – probably because there's one about two minutes from where I live. The staff is friendly and the prices are pretty good.
4 comments:
We went to Elliot 's Drugs, on the NW corner of 20th and Broadway. Mr. and Mrs. Friedman were nice, kind people, we had all our prescriptions filled there, and they had great candy and comic books. Mrs. Friedman was a substitute teacher at Boone, too.
...We were a Whalen's family for Rx, but anything else we went to Gray's.
Was Eliot's Drugs on the NW corner of 20th and Broadway the place that later turned into Paperback Exchange or a different named used book and new magazine shop?
Yep, the Paperback Exchange, where I bought and traded hundreds of books over the years.
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