The Medicine Factory today, located at 85 W. Virginia Avenue.
Dear Vance: My band recently filmed a video in an old building near Crump Blvd. called “The Medicine Factory,” and I hope you can tell me the story behind that name. — J.D., Memphis.
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An etched-glass sign by the front door is a clue to the building's long and colorful history.
Dear J.D.: I know that building — a rambling two-story brick structure at 85 W. Virginia (or, more accurately, Virginia Avenue, West). Since it’s located on a dead-end street, few people probably notice it, but that etched-glass “Medicine Factory” sign by the front door is certainly intriguing. The sign itself isn’t that old, but it pays tribute to the colorful history of what was at one time an office and factory for one of this country’s largest mail-order suppliers of products for people as well as poultry.
Poultry? I’d better explain.
The McConnon Company was founded in 1870 by Henry J. McConnon, who opened a drug store in the little town of Winona, Minnesota. Almost 30 years later, his brother, Joseph, would join him in the business, and they decided to branch out by selling their products through the mail. As best I can determine, in 1912 a second branch opened in Memphis. Why they chose this city, some 600 miles away from their headquarters, is somewhat of a mystery, but the range of products the McConnon Brothers made and distributed here is quite astonishing.
The front cover of a McConnon's catalog from the 1930s.
I know this because the Lauderdale Library contains an early copy of “The Rainbow Road to Health and Happiness.” It’s certainly one of the most entertaining catalogs I’ve ever encountered. On the very first page, the booklet describes the company as “Manufacturers of Helps to Good Housekeeping and Household Necessities,” bragging that they offered a complete range of “Flavoring Extracts, Baking Powder, Purity Spices, Py-Ade-Cocoa, Fly-Nocker, Liquid Polish, Toilet Articles, and Family and Veterinary Medicine.”
Wait. Did they say “Veterinary”? Oh yes, and hold onto your horses (ha) — I’ll get to that shortly.
Pages and pages are devoted to their “Yvonne” line of “articles that should be on every lady’s dressing table.” This included all kinds of soaps, powders, creams, pomades, perfumes, and such oddities as “comb-ade” and “shampoo jelly.” Other McConnon’s products were devoted to the care of the teeth, hands, and feet, with a special warning about stockings: “If they are too small, they cramp the feet; if too large, they cause corns and callouses.” And of course, McConnon’s sold products for that.
This initial chapter featured dozens of products for the dressing and bathrooms. Then McConnon’s moved into the kitchen, where they sold plenty of good things to eat: Boston Brown Bread, corn meal, griddle cakes, one-egg muffins, salads, desserts — the list goes on and on. Two pages are devoted to spices alone, in addition to “pudding sauces” and mustards and cakes and sugar and powder.
They were especially keen to persuade customers that food was worthless without spices, and so that’s why, to this day on eBay or even at garage sales, you can turn up colorfully labeled bottles of McConnon’s “compounds” for vanilla, caramel, strawberry, chocolate, maple, cinnamon, pineapple, orange, apple — I think you get (and taste) the picture. And besides enhancing the flavor, McConnon’s even helped cooks enhance the colors of their foods. I happen to own a vintage bottle of “McConnon’s Green Color” (I guess they didn’t want to call it “dye”) “for coloring candies, beverages, cakes, frostings, etc.”
Now that the company had you looking beautiful, and helped you prepare mouth-watering (and brightly colored) meals, what about your general health? Well, of course McConnon’s had that covered, too. After all, the firm originally started as a drug store. According to the catalog, “Sickness and disease stand on the threshold of every home, ready to cast its reflection of suffering and sorrow upon every member of the family.”
With that cheery thought, the company offered a mind-boggling selection of liniments, laxatives, cough mixtures, ointments, salves, “Pain Ease,” “Universal Healing Ointment,” and even something called “McConnon’s Ak-O-Dyne.” My goodness, just one tablespoon of this stuff, taken in conjunction with their “Rheum-Nall,” promised to cure sufferers of headaches, neuralgia, toothache, ear ache, colds, grippe, sciatica, rheumatism, and lumbago. I’m surprised any hospital in Memphis stayed in business, when all their patients had to do was take a spoonful of Ak-O-Dyne.
Now, earlier I had mentioned poultry, and yes, McConnon’s took care of critters, too. That seems a strange combination to me; it would be like sitting in a doctor’s waiting room with people who had brought in their beagle for a rabies shot. But the McConnon Brothers thought it was fine to offer plenty of practical advice — and products, of course — “For the Relief and Cure of Ailing Stock.” And by stock, they meant cattle, hogs, and chickens. I’ll spare you the horrifying details of their ailments, but thanks to McConnon’s, they at least got some relief with the company’s Sanitary Healing Powder, Barb Wire Balm, and even their vaguely named “Stock Tonic.”
Perhaps my favorite farm product, of all their curious offerings, was the gallon can of “Kre-Ol No. 1.” Never heard of it? Well then, you apparently never owned pigs or hogs, because this was expressly designed to “keep your wallow in a sanitary condition.” Now, if that doesn’t sound like a contradiction, I don’t know what is. A wallow, if you ask me, is not supposed to be sanitary.
I’m glad to see that the McConnon's old “medicine factory” is still standing, offering its resident artists their own “rainbow road to health and happiness.”
As mentioned (if you’ve been following me this far), McConnon’s didn’t sell their products in stores. Quite frankly, I don’t think any building in Memphis would be large enough to display all their offerings. Instead, they were sold “direct from wagon to consumer” by mail, or by placing an order when a dealer dropped by your home, farm, or hog wallow.
Despite what seemed to be a booming business, the McConnon Brothers closed their Memphis operation in 1930; that’s the last year the business is listed on Virginia Avenue. The company continued to operate out of its main complex in Winona, before closing for good sometime in the 1960s.
The old building in Memphis stood vacant for several years, then changed hands, serving as a home to Magee Truck Lines and later Dixie Shellers (though I can’t say what they shelled, exactly). In 1940, a fellow by the name of William Stewart opened a coffee company there, and within a year, he had expanded production to include potato chips, mayonnaise, almonds, vanilla wafers, and other tasty snacks. As far as I can tell from the old city directories, Stewart’s stayed in business until the early 1950s, when 85 Virginia, West, was taken over by the National Rose Company, which didn’t sell flowers at all, but produced a line of mattresses.
The ground-floor factory area has been transformed into a spacious art gallery.
The building stood vacant for almost three decades. In 2005, Memphis businessman Phillip Lewis bought it and converted the old factory into studio space for artists. He’s the one who put the “Medicine Factory” sign by the door, while also making major renovations, including a new roof, heating and air conditioning, and replacing more than 150 broken-out windows. Last year, he sold the property to his father, also named Phillip, and his brother, Joseph.
A few weeks ago, Joseph was kind enough to give me a tour of the old building, and it was a delightful place — a beehive of activity with some 15 painters, sculptors, photographers, and even an audio-visual company working in spacious studios on two floors. Downstairs, the old factory floor has been transformed into a large, high-ceiling gallery space and, as J.D. has written, original factory areas have even been used as sets for music videos.
All too often, when I write about old buildings, I end the column by saying the site is now a parking lot. I’m glad to see that the McConnon Brothers’ old “medicine factory” is still alive and well, offering its resident artists their own “rainbow road to health and happiness.”
