What many in the Town of Preeceville knew as the old Paul's Drugstore building came to an end when it was demolished and hauled away from the site.
J &R Pristie Holdings Ltd. of Preeceville was awarded the demolishing contract after the Town had received confirmation that all asbestos in the building had been removed by asbestos professionals.
The following information was provided by the From The Hearts and Hands of Healthcare cookbook.
“It was in June 1938 that pharmacist J.E. (Ed) Paul and his son Vern who was ten at the time, arrived in Preeceville. Preeceville was just beginning a period of post-depression prosperity and the so-called boom. Ed bought the drugstore business that had belonged to Hilding Carlson. It was located in a building rented from George Baal who was the pharmacist at Preeceville from 1915 to 1925. This building was located approximately between the building that housed the TD Bank and the lot that is currently known as the Centennial Park.
“Two years later, in 1940, Ed purchased the next building on the north side from Abe Kazakevich, which had formerly been the office of Burrows Lumber Co. and had been moved from First Avenue to Main Street. Added onto at least twice, once in 1952 and again around 1960, this building served the business for 34 years until it was moved in 1974. The Marshall Wells building was purchased and the business moved.
“Throughout the prosperous post-war period as other businesses came and went and changed hands in the flurry of economic activity which followed the end of the war, this business remained a pillar of the Preeceville business community.”
Ed and his wife Esther raised their family of five children in the living quarters upstairs in the building. Sons Dean and Clair had taken over the business from their father and later Clair's daughter Shannon Nelson operated the business. Shannon has fond memories that her father Clair had shared with her the anecdotes of the situations that he and his siblings would get into while growing up in that building.
The business was originally with the Rexall chain, then became a Price Watchers drugstore and continued with that chain for several years and is currently a PharmaChoice drugstore.
Through the years the building was used for numerous different business that included a Preeceville Radio and Television repair shop, Country Lane Florists, Sears and Uncle Macs used clothing shop until the building was purchased in 2010. A fire had destroyed part of the building a few years later and it was vacant for numerous years prior to it being turned over to the Town and demolished.
