Brockington Drugstore — Kingstree, South Carolina

This two-story commercial building in downtown Kingstree was built as a pharmacy around 1900, replacing an earlier building used for the same purpose. Pharmacist Dr. James Screven Brockington opened his drugstore on this site in 1873. Dr. Brockington died in 1892, and his son, Dr. W.V. “Jack” Brockington, continued the family business. It is thought that he replaced the original pharmacy with this brick building around the turn of the twentieth century.

A carriage block to assist Dr. James Brockington’s patients – and later his son’s patients – was placed on the street corner in front of the drugstore. The stone block served as a step to help people as they climbed in and out of their carriages. The carriage block remains an historical reminder of Kingstree’s downtown landscape in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century.

The first floor of the brick pharmacy has undergone modifications since it was built; most notably, the entrance door on the left was originally located on the corner of the building instead. Plate glass windows were also added. Several businesses have occupied the building over the years, including Gilman’s Real Estate and Jean’s Kut’n Kurl. Currently the historic building houses a florist and gift shop. According to contributor Linda Brown, today the building is owned by Jack Brockington’s great-granddaughter.

The Brockington Drugstore is listed in the National Register in the Kingstree Historic District as Gilman’s Real Estate and Jean’s Kut’n Kurl:

The Kingstree Historic District contains forty-eight properties situated along Main Street, Academy Street, and Hampton Street in the commercial area of downtown Kingstree. The district includes the courthouse, public library, railroad station, and numerous commercial buildings. The district is a fine collection of nineteenth-century vernacular commercial architecture. Details such as arched doorways and windows, cast-iron columns and pilasters, decorative or corbelled brick work and pressed tin interior ceilings are present on most of the district’s buildings. The Williamsburg County Courthouse, built ca. 1823, and designed by Robert Mills, is a fine example of Roman Neo-Classical design with its raised first floor, pediment with lunette, and Doric columns. In 1953-54 the courthouse underwent substantial remodeling on the exterior and interior, though it still reflects much of Mill’s original design. With the exception of the courthouse, most of the buildings in the district were built between 1900 and 1920 when Kingstree enjoyed prosperity as a retail and tobacco marketing center of Williamsburg County. The majority of the buildings in the district are a visible record of this twenty-year growth and the historic fabric of the area remains substantially intact.

Brockington Drugstore Map

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