Kahler Home & Drugstore

Although now a retail store, Jacksonville’s 120 West California Street address is one of the few town sites that once was used continuously for medical related purposes for 140 years!  

As early as 1855, G.W. Greer, “physician and surgeon,” occupied an office at this site, part of an assemblage of shops fronting California Street and known as Kennedy’s Row.  In 1862, L.S. Thompson had joined Greer in dispensing drugs and medicines.  Thompson purchased this lot and a year later had a new wood frame building erected.  By 1868, Sutton and Stearns were occupying the site, advertising “everything usually found in a first-class drug store.” 

Three years later the “City Drug Store” was in the possession of Robb & Kahler.  Robert Kahler was a member of a prominent Jacksonville family that came to Southern Oregon from Ohio in 1852.  Kahler had become a successful druggist, selling not only drugs, but also books, stationery, paints, oils, and other goods.  His brother, C.W., a prominent lawyer, bought the lot along with the property behind the Beekman Bank where he built his law office.  The business became known as “Kahler & Brothers.”  Robert had the current 1-story brick building constructed in 1880 at a cost of $2,000.  The local press eagerly declared it to be part of Jacksonville’s “New Boom.” 

As late as the 1980s the building was occupied by Dr. Griffin Osteopathic, the last medical related business to actually occupy the site.  (Today you may more closely associate Griffin with Jacksonville’s “Doc Griffin Park.”)  Although more recent owners have turned it into retail space, we should note they’ve also had close connections to the pharmaceutical industry.