| August 16, 2001 |
Contact: Lindsay
M. Moss |
ATLANTA -- Marietta dermatologist Dr. Paul Espy picked up medicine bottles wherever he went. In fact, he picked up so many that his collection of more than 2,500 over-the-counter prescription bottles began to overtake his house. The collection, which Espy started in 1972, includes medications dating back to the early 1900s and, while many may have originally cost only a few cents, the collection has been appraised to be worth several thousand dollars today.
With no more room to spare at his house or office, he decided to find a new home for his collection. Wanting it to go where people could appreciate the bottles and their sometimes unique ingredients, he found a new home for the collection at Mercer University's Southern School of Pharmacy in Atlanta.
"We are very excited about the collection," said Richard Jackson, director of the Center of Community Practice and Research at Mercer's School of Pharmacy. "It's interesting to look at the different ingredients used over time. We'll be able to show what products were being used to treat people in the past versus what is being used now. It's a nice contrast."
The collection was used during a recent presentation on arthritis. A Pharmacy School faculty member showed the changes in medication by pulling out the old arthritis medicine from Dr. Espy's collection and comparing it to the medicines now marketed.
Espy started his collection while working at a New Mexico hospital in the Navajo Indian Reservation. He stopped at a small pharmacy in Farmington, N.M., and noticed an over-the-counter medicine for skin diseases. Intrigued by the medicine, Espy read the label and was surprised to find he didn't recognize any of the ingredients or know anything about them.
"The medicine was foreign to me as a physician," said Espy. "We studied penicillin and other drugs in school, but people still have access to things that we know nothing about. It was fascinating to me that people took medicines like that."
Espy bought the skin medicine for 35 cents, thus beginning a collection that took him all over the country and lasted until products became too rare to find, almost 30 years later.
"Whenever I traveled, I would go back roads looking for old-fashioned pharmacies and looking for medicines that I didn't have," Espy said. "I was interested in the content and labels of the products and what the label said about the ingredients. I have a better appreciation for the huge variety of products available to consumers that are reported to have additional value."
Mercer's School of Pharmacy received more than 90 percent of Espy's collection, which includes over-the-counter drugs, such as Bitters, Humphrey's, Hadacol, Grove's Chill Tonic and Lydia Phinkham. He kept the dermatology products to display at his office.
"This collection comes at a very opportune time," said Jackson, who filled up an extended van and truck with boxes full of bottles when moving the collection to the Pharmacy School. "As the Southern School of Pharmacy prepares for its centennial anniversary in 2003, this collection is a great addition." Ñ
Mercer plans to display Espy's collection, which depicts almost a century of over-the-counter products, along with an exhibit of memorabilia from the Pharmacy School's 100-year-history, during the centennial celebration.
"I hope that this donation is just a seed that will grow," Espy said. "I hope it will serve as a stimulus for people to donate more to the School."
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