Early settler operated drug store business

This image, believed to have been taken before the Civil War, shows the businesses along the east side of North Main street, 300 block. The City Drug Store, operated by Thomas E. Brittingham (1794-1876) was located within this row of buildings. The Planters House hotel is visible in the row, as is the Morley Bros., wholesale food store. Steve Chou collection.

MARY LOU MONTGOMERY

Thomas E. Brittingham, (1794-1876) among the settlers when Hannibal was still in its infancy, was operating a drug store business on Hannibal’s Main street by 1847. 

Newspaper and genealogy records suggest that Mr. Brittingham brought his wife, Leah Shelby Brittingham, and children from Maryland to settle in Hannibal as early as 1837 (for reference, this was two years after Sam Clemens was born at Florida, Mo.) 

(Mr. T.E. Brittingham’s death notice in an 1875 Hannibal newspaper confirms the date of his family’s arrival in Hannibal as 1837.)

The family’s drug store, located within Sam Clemens’ old neighborhood, was three doors south of the City Hotel, in the 300 block of Main Street, west side of the street. The business was operated in partnership with T.E. Brittingham’s two sons, Dr. Littleton Thomas Brittingham (circa 1821-1901) and Dr. Irvin Baird Brittingham, (1825-1910).

The drug store continued to serve Hannibal residents until 1901, following the death of Littleton T. Brittingham, when he was about 80 years old. In 1901, the store was located at 313 N. Main. (A city parking lot is now situated where the Brittingham (or City) Drug Store once stood. Nearby, to the south, is the 2025 location of the Clemens General Store.)

What did they sell?

Scarpa’s Acoustic Oil, “The only cure for deafness! Pains in the ears, and also all those disagreeable noises like the buzzing of insects, falling of water, whizzing of steam, etc, which are symptoms of approaching deafness, and also generally attendant with the disease.” (Hannibal Journal, Aug. 12, 1847. newspapers.com)

Dr. Jackson’s Pile and Better Embrocation. “In addition to its being a positive remedy for the Piles, it never fails to cure that INTOLERABLE ITCHING which is so very common, and has its location in the same parts as the Piles. (Hannibal Journal, Sept. 2, 1847, newspapers.com)

West on Broadway

The family patriarch, who lived in what is now known as the 100 block of Broadway during the pre-Civil War years, had moved west from the center of Hannibal’s business district by the conclusion of the war, settling along Broadway, described in 1866 as between Ninth and Tenth.

We now know that he purchased Out Lot 72, and continued to live on this homestead property for the remainder of his life. He died at his home at 1 a.m. Aug. 12, 1876.

The elder Mr. Brittingham divided his property on Broadway, bequeathing the west half of Out Lot 72 to I.B. Brittingham, and the east half to L.T. Brittingham.

In 1885, there were three houses standing on the portion of Out Lot 72 adjoining Broadway:

820 Broadway: (Lot 1) a two-story frame dwelling, occupied by Littleton Brittingham.

824 Broadway: a two-story frame dwelling (Lot 2); and

830 Broadway, (Lot 3) a two-story frame dwelling, occupied by Irvin B. Brittingham.

Upon Littleton Brittingham’s death in 1901, he bequeathed Lot 1, Out Lot 72, to his daughter, Lizzie B. Coston, and his wife, Susan W. Brittingham.

When the county purchased a portion of land in Out Lot 72 in order to construct the new court house on that property, land owners were identified by the Marion County Herald on April 6, 1900:

Mrs. Ann McCooey, $1,760;

J.F. Williamson, $2,000; and

Mattie R. Holmes, $500.

Daughters

Thomas E. Brittingham, in addition to the sons previously mentioned, had three daughters:

Sarah M. Brittingham Hickman 1827-1889. Married to Philander Allen Hickman (1823-1881). They are buried at Mount Olivet Cemetery. (Sarah, a widow by 1885, made her home at 118 S. Fifth.)

Eleanor C. Brittingham Bull (1829-1900). Married to Franklin Bull (died in 1900). Buried at Riverside Cemetery.

Eleanor E.M. Brittingham Smith 1836-1909. Married to Benjamin Franklin Smith 1837-1915. She is buried at Mount Olivet Cemetery.

The Marion County Courthouse at Hannibal, completed in 1901, is seen wedged between two houses that previously belonged to the Brittingham family. Steve Chou collection.

In 1892, Irvin B. and Littleton T. Brittingham, sons of the late Thomas E. Brittingham, subdivided Out Lot 72 to form the Brittingham Subdivision. The west half of Out Lot 72 was titled to I.B. Brittingham, and the east half was titled to L.T. Brittingham. Lots 1, 2 and 3 now serve as land on which the Marion County Courthouse in Hannibal stands. The courthouse was constructed in 1900-01. The elder Mr. Brittingham, the patriarch of the family, owned Out Lot No. 72 as early as 1858, when a portion of the property was acquired to expand Center Street, from Ninth Street to Maple Avenue. Illustration by Mary Lou Montgomery

Thomas E. Brittingham, one of the early settlers of Hannibal, Mo., operated City Drug Store in the 300 block of North Main Street, west side of the street, when he placed this advertisement in the Hannibal Gazette newspaper, Sept. 9, 1847. newspapers.com

Mary Lou Montgomery, Suburban Newspapers of America Editor of the Year, Dailies, 2010, retired as editor of the Hannibal (Mo.) Courier-Post in 2014. She researches and writes narrative-style stories about the people who served as building blocks for this region’s foundation. Books available on Amazon.com by this author include but are not limited to: "The Notorious Madam Shaw," "Pioneers in Medicine from Northeast Missouri,” “Hannibal’s ‘West End,’” “Oakwood: West of Hannibal,”  and “St. Mary’s Avenue District.” Montgomery can be reached at Montgomery.editor@yahoo.com Her collective works can be found at www.maryloumontgomery.com