Upton on Severn, Worcestershire

 

Continuity or change?

The small riverside town of Upton-on-Severn has one of those traditional high streets that has evolved over the years to meet local needs, with apparently few incursions in the form of multiple retailers or big brands. You’ll find early-19th century buildings (sometimes with Venetian windows above), Victorian shop fronts, and a scattering of Edwardian or later gilded shop signs, preserved against the odds. Here’s one that’s small and quite easy to miss. It is above the door of one of the few ‘big names’ in Upton, a branch of Boot’s. It’s a pharmacy now and clearly was in 1881, when John Gibbs put up his plate in this very building.

Were pharmacists in the 1880s still stamping out pills by hand using little brass moulds and pouring our lotions and tinctures from large glass carboys? I’m not sure, but if they weren’t, that time could not have been long past. Pharmacists still have to be well qualified of course, but these days the medicines are usually manufactured elsewhere and packaged in blister packs. The gilded lettering of Mr Gibbs’s sign certainly harks back to the earlier era. It’s shiny but not flashy – simple, clear capitals that have none of the curls and elaborations of other Victorian signs. The effect must have been traditional and reassuring even in the 19th century.

And of course, it’s personal. When this sign was made, local people would have known the pharmacist and would have spoken of ‘Going to see Mr Gibbs,’ for some advice and a remedy. Today, the premises bear the name of the best known high street chemist. But it’s still not impossible that the people of this small town know the people who work here, and speak of them by name, and think of them differently from those who live in a big town and speak simply of ‘going to Boot’s’ to pick up their prescription. I don’t know this to be the case, but there’s the possibility of such a connection and continuity, reflected by the gilded lettering of this sign. If it’s there, it’s worth hanging on to.