Morning journal and courier., 1886-10-21
BLACK MEN AS DRUGGISTS.
Finding Success In the Busfness-TI
 Pupfla of pr Smith

Finding Success in the Busfness-The Pupils of Dr. Smith
 From the New York Tribune.l
 Pedestrians in lower Sixth avenue on the east side of the street often pause and gaze curiously in the window of large, neatly kept drug store. It is not the orange and blue globes in the windows, nor the rows on rows of medicine jars with their abbreviated Latin labels in gold letters that arrest the steps and fix the attention of the passers-by, but the sight of full blooded African be- hind the counter mixing prescriptions and attending to things generally in a manner that stamps him as the proprietor of the es- tablishment. Many people stare at the col ored man through the big windows as if they were gazing upon an apparition. There is always number of customers in the store and the druggist does prosperous business The complexlons of his customers are about equally divided between white and black If anything there are more white customers than black. Anyone conversing with G. A. Francis, this black man, would be surprised at the intelligence he displays. He is proud of his race
 'Colored druggists not variety in this county, sir," said he to Tribune re- porter, "though America is more prejudiced against my race than any other nation under the sun. There are many colored druggists in the United States. There are half doz- en in this city and three in Brooklyn. And they know their business too. Perhaps I am the only one though that you would take to be negro by looking through the window. The rest are generally taken for West Indi- ans. We all took the cue to become pharma- cists from Dr. James McCune Smith, Oxon. He was the first negro druggist in this city and probably in the country Although a full blooded African, friends kindly sent him to England in 1845. He had to 1eav- his country to be educated, sir, but he was grad uated at Oxford, returned to this country and opened 8 pharmacy in West Broadway, which he continued successfully till he died. Dr. Smith had several colored pupils. One of them, P. A. White, has fine place in Gold street, in the Swamp. He is the friend and companion of the rich leather merchants. Horace Greeley, Jackson A. Schultz and men Of that class patronized his place of business in the Swamp. He is a member and one of the oldest of the College of Pharmacy of this citv.''
 Are you graduate of pharmacya" ''I have license given me aftsr passing my examination. I learned chemistry from private teacher in Bridgeport. where l was born. After I had studied chemistry clerked in the drug store of colored man in Brooklyn and there I finished my educa- tion." The colored druggist went on to speak with pride of the achievements of his race ill intellectual pursuits. AS shining ex- amples of what they could do he cited the merits of Dr. Alexander Cromwell, the Epis- copal minister of Washington, full blood ed negro whose grandfather was an African prince; mentioned Frederick Douglass, the orator, and referred periodically to Christ mas Attacks, the co.ored man who was among the first to fall before the British in the streets of Boston for raising the stand ard of American independence.