P.O. Drug

The Colonial Revival building at 55 DeForest Street is also known as the Health Complex. In the 18th century, Younglove Cutler owned a wooden building at this location which functioned as a general store. About 1799, Benjamin DeForest replaced Cutler’s wooden building with a brick structure which also served as a shoe shop and post office. Later it was owned by Levi Curtiss, who leased it to Orrin Starr for ten years, at an annual rent of $225. After being in the Curtiss family for 60 years, Bennet C. Atwood bought it late in the 19th century and enlarged the property. It continues as our neighborhood pharmacy and medical supply business.

The old drug store has been a landmark for a full century; it was first occupied as a country store to which the people of Waterbury came to trade, carried on in connection with the store, was the business of pork packing, and many thousands of barrels left its doors for the West Indies.  Through all the years that have passed since it was built, it has always been occupied as a store. 

Besides it’s first owner Benjamin DeForest, it has been occupied by the following well known individuals and firms, Eli Curtis, Starr, Clark & Company, O. S. Starr, Merwin & Warner, Myron McNeil, Woodward & Woodward. Atwood & Abbott, Atwood & Wilson, B. C. Atwood, L. E. Southworth.

The store was once an actual post office, back in the days of Postmaster Cahuncey Hotchkiss in the late 1800s.  A new building eventually was constructed next to it, before postal services were moved to Heminway Park Road in 1955.  Over the years, its been called The Trading Post, Starr & Clark, Ben Atwood’s and Southworth and Randall.

During the building’s history as the Post Office Drug Store, owner Mr. P. B. Randall was established in 1842.  His slogan was “Located on the Hill; Does Business on the Level.”  It was known as one of the best equipped and stocked drug stores in the state of Connecticut.