Standard Drug Company was a drugstore chain based in Richmond

Richmond, Virginia

Richmond is the capital of the Commonwealth of Virginia, in the United States. It is an independent city and not part of any county. Richmond is the center of the Richmond Metropolitan Statistical Area and the Greater Richmond area...

, Virginia

Virginia

The Commonwealth of Virginia , is a U.S. state on the Atlantic Coast of the Southern United States. Virginia is nicknamed the "Old Dominion" and sometimes the "Mother of Presidents" after the eight U.S. presidents born there...

. It was founded in 1920 by Gil Rosenthal, and thrived for decades, expanding into the counties surrounding Richmond and other parts of the state, particularly the Hampton Roads

Hampton Roads

Hampton Roads is the name for both a body of water and the Norfolk–Virginia Beach metropolitan area which surrounds it in southeastern Virginia, United States...

 area.

Sale

In October 1993, the 60-store Standard Drug chain was bought by CVS Corp., which closed several locations and renamed the others as Peoples Drug

Peoples Drug

Peoples Drug was a chain of drug stores based in Alexandria, VA, a suburb of Washington, D.C.. Founded in 1904, 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...

 stores. CVS had purchased the Washington, D.C.

Washington, D.C.

Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....

-based Peoples in 1990, renovating and expanding most of the stores, but had retained the Peoples name. At the time of the company's purchase of Standard, plans already were under way to change the Peoples locations to CVS/Pharmacy stores. That name change happened in May 1994. Instead of keeping the Standard name until the change to CVS, the company made the temporary change to Peoples, as the stores' designs would be much closer to the future look of CVS stores, thus making the upcoming change to CVS much easier.

Legacy

Evidence of Standard's presence in Richmond still exists, including an old billboard in Downtown Richmond and two storefronts on which the imprint of the Standard Drug Company name is still visible. One of these is on North 1st Street in Downtown, and the other is in the 1300 block of Hull Street on South Side. The Hull Street building dates back to the 1920s, and has been cited for its historic architecture, along with most of the Old Manchester neighborhood in which it is located.
The company also is remembered for its Carytown location, which housed a pet monkey in its basement, along with a digital

Digital

A digital system is a data technology that uses discrete values. By contrast, non-digital systems use a continuous range of values to represent information...

 thermometer

Thermometer

Developed during the 16th and 17th centuries, a thermometer is a device that measures temperature or temperature gradient using a variety of different principles. A thermometer has two important elements: the temperature sensor Developed during the 16th and 17th centuries, a thermometer (from the...

 and clock on the building's east side. The store is now a CVS, but was renovated in the mid-2000s so that the digital sign no longer exists. Another type of digital sign, more typical of CVS stores, now adorns another part of the east wall.