Boone Drug goes

back in time
By Mark Mitchell

The smiles were plentiful, the laughs hearty, and the memories priceless in downtown Boone on Thursday evening as Boone Drug Co. held a combination birthday celebration/reunion celebration at the business established in 1919.

A longtime fixture in the heart of downtown Boone, Boone Drug used the evening to commemorate its 90 years in business, while at the same time, welcome back of children who were born on the second floor of the building in the Hagaman Clinic.

“We just started wondering how many people were still alive who were born here,” said Boone Drug Co. co-owner John Stacy, “then thought, let's invite them all here to mingle and tell stories of what their memories were of the building and of that time.”

In total, 20 people who were delivered in the Hagaman Clinic made their way back to Boone Drug for the event, a number that was increased by 30 with spouses and friends. Actually, the number of 20 Hagaman Clinic deliveries was disputed (jokingly) when Joe Miller, owner of Cheap Joe's Art Stuff and former co-owner of Boone Drug Co., recounted the story of how he was delivered outside of the clinic in his family's Model T Ford when his mother was unable to get up the stairs to the office.

More stories were told around a dinner of shepherd's pie, peas and carrots, baked apples and strawberry cobbler, including one from one of the last children to be born at the clinic, Ala Sue McGuire.

“One of my earliest memories is running to Boone Drug to get food and drinks for customers to my mother's beauty shop,” said McGuire. “My mother, Ala McGuire, owned the first beauty shop in town, and I thought it was a fun thing to do. I lived in the beauty shop, except for the times when all of us high school kids would go to Boone Drug to hang out and flirt.”

Ala Sue's brothers, Buddy and Phil, also made the trek to the reunion, in part, because of the close relationship their mother had with J.B. Hagaman and his family.

“The Hagaman family actually gave my mother a cutting from a rose bush they had in their yard,” said Buddy, who resides in Granite Falls. “Mr. Hagaman and my mom were friends. She gave a cutting to my brother Phil, who lives in Virginia, and he gave me a cutting for my home. So, that rose bush has been in a lot of yards in a few states.”

The evening also featured numerous other stories and a prize giveaway, but in the end, it was all about getting a piece of historic Boone together again.

“There are so many stories, so many great stories that have been told here,” said Stacy, “and why not, this used to be a happening place.”