At first glance, it is difficult to recognize the undated parade photograph shown above. It was taken on Main Street in Great Barrington where the recently shuttered Walgreens Pharmacy now stands. The house shown on the left is now Green Branch Urban Farm Apothecary & Provisions. Tinker’s Sunoco Gas Station (the smaller center structure) was later torn down, and Melvin Katsh opened his popular drug and variety store on the site in 1950. The house on the right was torn down in 1972 when Melvin’s Pharmacy was expanded. The store was gutted by fire in 1978 and rebuilt. In 1982, Katsh sold his business to the Brooks Drugstore chain. Because Melvin’s had been so popular, Brooks put up a “Formerly Melvin’s” sign on the building. The pharmacy later became Rite-Aid and then Walgreens. Today the building is vacant.
