@this.old.california: THE COUNTER AT THE BACK OF THE DRUGSTORE — Fosselman's and the Fountain 🍦🥤 Here's the part people forget: the soda fountain exists because of the pharmacist. ✨ Druggists already had carbonated water on hand and were already mixing things to order, so they started selling flavored sodas over the counter as a sideline — and then the sideline took over the store. By the fifties there was a fountain at the back of the drugstore in every town in California, and you walked right past the prescription window to get to it. Marble or Formica counter. Chrome stools that spun. A row of syrup pumps, a carbonated water tap, and a wall of glasses stacked upside down on a towel. 🥄 And it was where the neighborhood actually met. Mothers with a shopping list. Old men drinking coffee at ten in the morning for no particular reason. Kids after school with a quarter. Some shops made their own ice cream right there in the back, and a few places in California still do — Fosselman's over in Alhambra has been at it since 1919. Then the chains bought up the drugstores and pulled the counters out for shelf space. Was there a fountain in your town? 🧡 #SodaFountain #OldCalifornia #Alhambra #DrugstoreDays #RememberWhen
