BACK IN TIME: Hammer and Hammer pharmacy

Don and Norma Harris recently donated the above bottle to the Mitchell Area Historical Society. Don found the bottle when removing a window from a house, located at 401 S. Edmunds. Marked “Hammer and Hammer Pharmacists Mitchell Dakota,” the bottle was used to dispense medicine probably as early as 1880 when Frank and Allison Hammer constructed a new building at 101 N. Main St. (the former recent site of the Longhorn Bar) to replace the pharmacy they had established in 1879 in Firesteel. In 1902, the Hammers closed the Mitchell business and moved it to Ethan. The 132-year-old bottle is displayed at the Carnegie Resource Center, and is an important reminder of the Hammer family, who played a vital role in Mitchell’s history(Photo courtesy of the Mitchell Carnegie Resource Center)