The Druggist's Drawers
A 19th-century American apothecary drawer bank with hand-painted labels
These sixteen drawers once stood behind the counter of a small-town drugstore, sometime between the Civil War and the 1890s. Before medicine came in bottles, a druggist bought dried roots, barks, leaves, and gums in bulk and mixed each prescription by hand. These drawers held the raw ingredients.
The labels are in Latin, the working language of pharmacy, and every one was painted by hand with a brush. You can see the painter's uneven strokes and little flourishes, and a few spelling mistakes, which tells us he was a sign painter working from what the druggist told him.
The drawers held real medicine and real poison side by side: wintergreen and comfrey next to nux vomica and aconite. When packaged drugs took over after 1900, most fittings like this were torn out and burned. This one survived with its original paint and iron knobs.
And this great piece can be yours for just $900!