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This community used to have its own department stores, furniture stores, drug stores, supermarkets. Most of those places are gone, though the 99s and some of the corner markets carry a variety of cheap household goods that will do in a pinch. It’s not the same thing as a store where you could go in and buy a pair of shoes, a corner table, gloves to wear with your Easter dress, the latest record. Now the closest you can get to that kind of store is Target or Wal-Mart, and those are down in National City, Chula Vista.
I remember when my brother or I were sick, we’d get taken to Dr. Tanaka’s or Dr. Ford’s, then make the trip to one of the local drug stores. There are no private doctors around here anymore, and most of the corner drug stores are closed. Galloway’s Pharmacy, on the corner of South 30th and National, had a counter and stools where you could order fountain drinks and ice cream treats. They also had candy, cosmetics, greeting cards, things people needed for common ailments, toys, books, racks of magazines. There was a spinning round rack filled with comic books. I used to regularly come down with sore throats and ear infections, so I spent a good bit of time in there waiting for my grandmother to fill prescriptions. I would browse through and stock up on the latest comics, reading material for the coming days I would spend in bed as an invalid.
Eventually, the counter was removed Then so was much of the merchandise. Then everything was stripped down to the bare walls, a few stock remedies sitting on mostly empty shelves. Half of the floor space was now behind a counter topped by glass dividers where pharmacy techs attended to people standing in lines to drop off or pick up their prescriptions. Outside, the sidewalk had buckled and cracked, weeds sprouted, old gum spots multiplied.
Last spring, FBI and ATF agents swarmed over the place, filling vans full of cardboard bank boxes, just like you see them do on TV. I asked one of the pharmacists later what had happened and he said some employees had been selling narcotics, that three stores had been raided, but that Galloway’s would be open for business again as soon as they could get through some legal issues. The pharmacy closed a day or two, then re-opened but couldn’t sell narcotics, then a few months later was cleared to do business again.
A large storage room was added onto the back. Inside the store, a wall was built straight across the floor with a glass window in the middle, barely leaving room for a small lobby and a few plastic chairs where people sit and wait for their medications. It’s basically a drug dispensary now, owned by a family by the name of Atiya; the Atiyas own all three of the pharmacies which were raided that day in 1998. According to reports, they bought the pharmacy from the Galloway family in 1995, and turned it into a “specialty” pharmacy. All that’s left of the old Galloway’s is the sign outside.
This community used to have its own department stores, furniture stores, drug stores, supermarkets. Most of those places are gone, though the 99s and some of the corner markets carry a variety of cheap household goods that will do in a pinch. It’s not the same thing as a store where you could go in and buy a pair of shoes, a corner table, gloves to wear with your Easter dress, the latest record. Now the closest you can get to that kind of store is Target or Wal-Mart, and those are down in National City, Chula Vista.
I remember when my brother or I were sick, we’d get taken to Dr. Tanaka’s or Dr. Ford’s, then make the trip to one of the local drug stores. There are no private doctors around here anymore, and most of the corner drug stores are closed. Galloway’s Pharmacy, on the corner of South 30th and National, had a counter and stools where you could order fountain drinks and ice cream treats. They also had candy, cosmetics, greeting cards, things people needed for common ailments, toys, books, racks of magazines. There was a spinning round rack filled with comic books. I used to regularly come down with sore throats and ear infections, so I spent a good bit of time in there waiting for my grandmother to fill prescriptions. I would browse through and stock up on the latest comics, reading material for the coming days I would spend in bed as an invalid.
Eventually, the counter was removed Then so was much of the merchandise. Then everything was stripped down to the bare walls, a few stock remedies sitting on mostly empty shelves. Half of the floor space was now behind a counter topped by glass dividers where pharmacy techs attended to people standing in lines to drop off or pick up their prescriptions. Outside, the sidewalk had buckled and cracked, weeds sprouted, old gum spots multiplied.
Last spring, FBI and ATF agents swarmed over the place, filling vans full of cardboard bank boxes, just like you see them do on TV. I asked one of the pharmacists later what had happened and he said some employees had been selling narcotics, that three stores had been raided, but that Galloway’s would be open for business again as soon as they could get through some legal issues. The pharmacy closed a day or two, then re-opened but couldn’t sell narcotics, then a few months later was cleared to do business again.
A large storage room was added onto the back. Inside the store, a wall was built straight across the floor with a glass window in the middle, barely leaving room for a small lobby and a few plastic chairs where people sit and wait for their medications. It’s basically a drug dispensary now, owned by a family by the name of Atiya; the Atiyas own all three of the pharmacies which were raided that day in 1998. According to reports, they bought the pharmacy from the Galloway family in 1995, and turned it into a “specialty” pharmacy. All that’s left of the old Galloway’s is the sign outside.