Hook's Drug Stores

Last updated
Hook's Drug Stores
Founded1900
Defunct1994
FateAcquired by Revco
Successor CVS, following acquisition of Revco
Headquarters Indianapolis, Indiana, U.S.
ProductsPharmacy, cosmetics, health and beauty aids, general merchandise, snacks

Hook's Drug Stores was an Indianapolis, Indiana-based drug store chain which was founded in 1900 by John A. Hook. The chain flourished throughout central Indiana for most of the 20th-century.

Contents

Hook's did business under its own banner, the SupeRX Drug Stores banner outside its core market, and the Brooks Pharmacy banner after acquiring the New England pharmacy chain. The entire company was eventually purchased by fellow Midwestern drugstore chain Revco.

Most former Hook's locations that are still open operate as CVS, which bought out Revco in the late 1990s and rebranded their stores as CVS. The Brooks Pharmacy stores were divested by Revco after the purchase; most of them operate as Rite Aid stores.

History

A typical Hook's store in New Castle, Indiana, in 1974 Hooks in 1974.jpg
A typical Hook's store in New Castle, Indiana, in 1974

In October 1900, pharmacist John A. Hook opened the first Hook's Drug Store in an Indianapolis German community at the corner of South East and Prospect Streets. A second location opened at the corner of New Jersey and East Washington Streets and Hook added Edward F. Roesch as a partner. [1] By 1912, the chain had expanded to twelve stores. Many of Hook's interwar drug stores were designed by Kurt Vonnegut Sr. of Vonnegut & Bohn. Roesch became president of the company in 1943 upon Hook's death. In 1956, following Roesch's death in a traffic accident, John Hook's son, August F. “Bud” Hook, assumed leadership of the company. The chain added 150 new stores between 1946 and 1972. [2]

In 1985, The Kroger Company outbid Rite Aid, which had attempted a hostile takeover, [1] and acquired the Hook's chain. Kroger divested itself of Hook's and its own SupeRx drugstores a year later, and Hook's became a division of the privately held Hook's-SupeRx. [2]

Hook's-SupeRx acquired the New England–based Brooks Pharmacy chain in 1988. [3] Hooks-SupeRx stores traded under three different names - Hook's Drug and SupeRx in the Midwest and Brooks Pharmacy in New England. Hook's-SupeRx was acquired by Revco in 1994. [1] Revco was subsequently acquired by CVS in 1997. Many former Hook's locations are now CVS Pharmacies.

A restored 19th-century Hook's drug store stands at the Indiana State Fairgrounds, and is a popular attraction at the annual Indiana State Fair. It was originally built in 1849 and has been restored with authentic 19th century cabinets. [1]

Hook's Apothecary

In 2000, the great-grandchildren of John A. Hook opened Hook's Apothecary in Evansville, Indiana. The store specializes in compounding prescriptions. It has no corporate ties to CVS.

Hook's Oxygen and Medical Equipment

After Hook's was sold to Revco, the Oxygen and Medical Equipment stores continued under the Hook's name in many of the same locations as before. It is now a subsidiary of Rotech Medical Corporation. [4]

Related Research Articles

Albertsons Companies, Inc. is an American grocery company founded and headquartered in Boise, Idaho.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Osco Drug and Sav-on Drugs</span> Retail pharmacy chains in the United States

Osco Drug and Sav-on Drugs were the names of a pair of chain pharmacies that operated in the United States. Osco Drug was founded by the Skaggs family. Alpha Beta grocery store was purchased by American Stores in 1961. Skaggs Drug Centers bought American Stores in 1979 and assumed the American Stores name. Sav-on Drugs was a California-based pharmacy chain that was acquired by Osco's parent company in 1980. Both Osco and Sav-on stores eventually came under the ownership of American Stores, then Albertsons, and finally SuperValu before the stores were sold off.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kroger</span> American retail company

The Kroger Company, or simply Kroger, is an American retail company that operates supermarkets and multi-department stores throughout the United States.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jean Coutu Group</span>

The Jean Coutu Group (PJC) Inc. is a Canadian drugstore chain headquartered in Varennes, Quebec. It has more than 400 franchised locations in New Brunswick, Ontario and Quebec under the PJC Jean Coutu, PJC Clinique, and PJC Santé banners. The company was once the third largest distributor and retailer of pharmaceuticals and related products in North America, with nearly 2,200 drug stores. Its American stores have been sold to Rite Aid.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">CVS Pharmacy</span> American pharmacy chain

CVS Pharmacy, Inc. is an American retail corporation. A subsidiary of CVS Health, it is headquartered in Woonsocket, Rhode Island. Originally named the Consumer Value Store, it was founded in Lowell, Massachusetts in 1963.

Schnucks is a supermarket chain. Based in the St. Louis area, the company was founded in 1939 with the opening of a 1,000-square-foot (93 m2) store in north St. Louis and currently operates over 100 stores in four states throughout the Midwest. Schnucks also ran stores under the Logli Supermarkets and Hilander Foods banners. Schnucks is one of the largest privately-held supermarket chains in the United States and dominates the St. Louis metro grocery market.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Eckerd Corporation</span> Defunct American pharmacy

Eckerd Corporation was an American drug store chain that was headquartered in Largo, Florida, and toward the end of its life, in Warwick, Rhode Island.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rite Aid</span> American drugstore chain

Rite Aid Corporation is an American drugstore chain based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was founded in 1962 in Scranton, Pennsylvania, by Alex Grass under the name Thrift D Discount Center. The company ranked No. 148 in the Fortune 500 list of the largest United States corporations by total revenue.

Revco Discount Drug Stores, once based in Twinsburg, Ohio, was a major drug store chain operating through the Ohio Valley, the Mid-Atlantic states, and the Southeastern United States. The chain's stock was traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol RXR. Revco was sold to CVS Pharmacy for $2.8 billion in February 1997. When it was sold, the chain had over 2,500 stores.

Longs Drugs is an American chain owned by parent company CVS Health with approximately 70 drugstores throughout the state of Hawaii and formerly in the Continental US.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Marsh Supermarkets</span> Defunct grocery chain based in central Indiana

Marsh Supermarkets was an American retail food chain headquartered in Indianapolis, Indiana, with a peak number of 86 stores in 2013 located throughout central Indiana and parts of western Ohio. Its eventual parent company was Sun Capital Partners, headquartered in Boca Raton, Florida.

Big B, Inc. was a Birmingham, Alabama-based drugstore chain. The company began operation in 1968 as division of Birmingham based Bruno's Supermarkets. Most of its stores were located next to a Bruno's, Food World or FoodMax. Big B also operated a discount drugstore chain called Drugs For Less. The company had close to $800 million in revenue by the end of 1996.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">American Stores</span> American grocery store holding company

American Stores Company was an American public corporation and a holding company which ran chains of supermarkets and drugstores in the United States from 1917 through 1998. The company was incorporated in 1917 when The Acme Tea Company merged with four small Philadelphia-area grocery stores (Childs, George Dunlap, Bell Company, and A House That Quality Built) to form American Stores. In the following eight decades, the company would expand to 1,575 food and drugstores in 38 states with $20 billion in annual sales in 1998.

Brooks Pharmacy was a chain of more than 330 pharmacies located throughout New England and New York and was a well-recognized name in the New England pharmacy industry for several decades. The corporate headquarters were located in Warwick, Rhode Island.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Peoples Drug</span>

Peoples Drug was a chain of drugstores based in Alexandria, Virginia. Founded in 1905, Peoples was subsequently purchased by Lane Drug in 1975, Imasco in 1984, and finally by CVS in 1990, which continued to run the stores under the Peoples banner until 1994, at which time the stores were converted to CVS, marking the end of the use of the Peoples Drug name.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Thrift Drug</span> Defunct American pharmacy

Thrift Drug was a U.S. pharmacy chain founded in 1935 and based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

CVS Health Corporation is an American healthcare company that owns CVS Pharmacy, a retail pharmacy chain; CVS Caremark, a pharmacy benefits manager; and Aetna, a health insurance provider, among many other brands. The company is the world's largest healthcare company, and its headquarters are in Woonsocket, Rhode Island.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Perry Drug Stores</span> Defunct American pharmacy chain

Perry Drug Stores was an American retail pharmacy chain founded in 1957 in the city of Pontiac, Michigan, United States. At its peak in the 1980s, Perry operated more than 200 drug stores, primarily in the state of Michigan, as well as 200 Auto Works auto parts stores and fourteen A. L. Price discount health and beauty aids outlets. In 1995, Perry Drug Stores was bought out by Rite Aid, a pharmacy chain based in Camp Hill, Pennsylvania. The Perry chain, which at the time comprised 224 stores, was the largest acquisition ever made by Rite Aid. In addition, this acquisition brought the Rite Aid name to the Detroit area for the first time.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 "Hook's Drugs, Inc. and Hook's American Drugstore Museum". Archived from the original on February 17, 2013. Retrieved December 7, 2012.
  2. 1 2 Bodenhamer, David J.; Robert Graham Barrows; David Gordon Vanderstel (1994). The Encyclopedia of Indianapolis. Indianapolis: Indiana University Press. p. 706. ISBN   0-253-31222-1.
  3. ↑ Bodenhamer, David J.; Robert Graham Barrows; David Gordon Vanderstel (1994). The Encyclopedia of Indianapolis. Indianapolis: Indiana University Press. pp. 706–707. ISBN   0-253-31222-1.
  4. ↑ SEC Info - Rotech Medical Corp - 10-K - For 7/31/96 - EX-22.1
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.