This shop is one of the earliest in Gawler Street.  The site used to be known as “Richardson’s Corner,” after the Richardson family who ran a chemist shop here for over fifty years.

Pharmacist Joseph Bull (1817-1857) first established a chemist shop at this site in 1853, and Adam Watson Richardson (1829-1894) purchased it the following year.  Richardson had trained as a chemist in Edinburgh before emigrating to Australia in 1853.  Arriving first in Melbourne, he travelled to South Australia, where his uncle William Richardson had established a rural holding at Woodchester.  At first he operated the business in partnership with fellow druggist Robert Cayme, but within two years he had become the sole proprietor.  He ran “A.W. Richardson’s” here until his death in 1894.

The principal role of pharmacists in the nineteenth century was much as it is today, involving the preparation and dispensing of remedies and the counselling of patients. Other products sold at Richardson’s included books, stationery, dress-making patterns, wallpaper, window glass, oils, paints, kerosene, lamps, veterinary medicines, and tobacco products including cigars, pouches and pipes. Richardson’s also accommodated the Mount Barker Post Office between 1854 and 1860, and the local branch of the Bank of Australasia in the 1880s.

Over the years Richardson established several additional pharmacies in Hills towns, including Nairne, Woodside and Mount Pleasant. He was highly regarded in the Mount Barker community, serving for many years as a Justice of the Peace and giving his time to numerous local institutions and committees. (See also:https://mtbarkernationaltrust.org.au/history-post/richardson-family/.)

Richardson was married twice. His first wife was Jane (“Jeannie”) Thomson (1842-1881), with whom he had ten children before Jeannie died at the age of 39.  Two years later, Richardson married 21-year-old Albertina Moss (1862-1947), daughter of Mount Barker cabinetmaker Simeon Moss (see 23-23a Gawler St).  At the time of her marriage Albertina was the same age as her oldest step-child. The family had three more children before Richardson died of pneumonia, aged 65.

Albertina kept running the pharmacy for another thirteen years. She was one of several widows in Gawler Street who ran businesses after the deaths or absences of their husbands, including Jane Hooper, Mary McKenzie, Sophia Barker and Louisa Starling.  When, as in this case, the businesses retained their husbands’ names, this tended to obscure the women’s role as proprietors.  Albertina showed considerable entrepreneurial flair, which included introducing a visiting dental service in 1899.

In January 1906 Albertina leased the shop to Walter Herbert Blades, who had worked there since the time of A.W. Richardson as a dispensing chemist and manager.  Blades was well-liked and competent, so there was general consternation when, a few weeks later, Blades was prosecuted for “unlawfully assuming the title of dispensing chemist.”  The charge was over a technicality, as Blades had overlooked some regulatory requirements when assuming the lease under his own name.  The matter came to court, with the prosecutor arguing that a similar case in Queensland had resulted in a criminal conviction.  The magistrate, James Gordon, was unmoved.  He viewed the prosecution as an unwarranted interference in the conduct of Blades’ business, and declared that “I don’t care if fifty cases have been decided.  It is contrary to common sense.” Case dismissed, costs awarded to Walter Blades.

In 1912 the shop was sold at auction to land broker H.B. Chapman.  By this time a pharmacy had been continually operating on the site for nearly sixty years.

The photo below shows A.W. Richardson’s chemist shop, c. 1885, when hitching posts for horses still lined the streets (click to enlarge).  Although the shop faced Gawler Street, there were two adjoining cottages to the rear in Walker Street, both of which survive as retail outlets.