Hanna-Robinson-Richey Drugstore
Chico, Wise County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Alexander Virgil Hanna (1860-1921) erected this native sandstone structure to house his drugstore in 1893. He provided office space in this building for a doctor, lawyer, jeweler, and the first telephone switchboard in Chico. Hanna sold the business in 1920 to Rueben R. Robinson (1872-1955), whose daughter and son-in-law, LaBeth and William Marston Mead (d. 1968) continued to operate the store after his death. It was purchased in 1973 by Bobby and Frances Richey.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Alexander Virgil Hanna raised this native sandstone building in 1893 to house his drugstore in Chico, renting space to a doctor, lawyer, jeweler, and the town's first telephone switchboard. The business passed in 1920 to Rueben R. Robinson, whose daughter and son-in-law carried it on, and the property changed hands again in 1973. The solid stone structure remained a hub of small-town commerce and communication across three families' stewardship.
Why it matters
A single stone storefront that held a druggist, professionals, and the town's first switchboard shows how modern conveniences and services first reached rural North Texas under one roof.
The story behind this marker
AI contextThe era
In 1893, when Alexander Virgil Hanna built his sandstone drugstore, Chico was one of many small North Texas communities serving the farms and ranches around it. Wise County had long since moved past its frontier years. Towns were becoming places of business, with merchants, professional offices, and the first signs of modern technology.
The small-town drugstore was one of the most important businesses of that era. The druggist mixed medicines and gave advice, and customers came in for supplies, conversation, and news. Rural doctors and druggists often worked side by side, and a drugstore building was a natural place for other professionals to set up shop.
The 1890s were also when the telephone began spreading beyond big cities into small towns. Early local telephone service depended on a switchboard, where an operator connected calls by hand. That made the switchboard's location something of a community nerve center. The marker's note that Chico's first switchboard sat in this building places it at the start of a technological change in everyday rural life.
People & events
Alexander Virgil Hanna, who lived from 1860 to 1921, built this solid structure of native sandstone in 1893 to house his drugstore. He also shared it with a doctor, a lawyer, and a jeweler, and with Chico's first telephone switchboard. Under one roof, a resident of 1890s Chico could fill a prescription, see a physician, get legal advice, have a watch repaired, and place a call.
Hanna ran the business for close to three decades. In 1920, the year before he died, he sold it to Rueben R. Robinson, who lived from 1872 to 1955. The drugstore stayed in Robinson's family after his death: his daughter and son-in-law, LaBeth and William Marston Mead, kept it running. That continuity of ownership kept the building a familiar part of town life for generations.
In 1973 Bobby and Frances Richey bought the property. It was the third family to take care of the building. The marker's three-part name, Hanna-Robinson-Richey, honors that long chain of owners, each of whom helped the stone storefront endure.
Its place in the American story
In many ways, the American small-town drugstore was the country's first all-purpose community center. For decades before shopping malls and chain stores, the corner drugstore was where rural and small-town Americans went for medicine, everyday goods, and a sense of connection with their neighbors. Hanna's building, with its offices for a doctor, lawyer, and jeweler, shows how one storefront could serve as a town's commercial and professional hub.
The telephone switchboard links this modest building to one of the great technological changes of the era. As telephone service spread into rural America in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, isolated communities gained a new way to reach doctors, family, and markets. Chico's first link to that network ran through this building.
The building's long run under a few families also speaks to something enduring in American small towns. Local businesses were often handed down or sold to neighbors instead of disappearing, and the buildings that held them became landmarks of shared memory.
If you visit
Look closely at the building itself. The native sandstone walls have held up since 1893, and their texture and color tie the structure to the local landscape. Picture the scene more than a century ago: customers coming for medicines, clients climbing to see the lawyer or doctor, and somewhere inside, an operator connecting Chico's first telephone calls.
Chico is a small, unhurried town, the kind of place where a short stroll tells you a lot about how North Texas communities grew. The drugstore is a good reminder of how much everyday life once centered on a single main-street building.
This stop fits nicely into a back-roads drive through Wise County and the rolling country northwest of Fort Worth, with small towns and historic markers scattered along the way. If the building is privately owned or in business, enjoy it from the sidewalk and respect the property.
Written by AI to add context, grounded in the marker’s inscription and the historical record. The inscription above is the original, unaltered text.
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Related people
- · Alexander Virgil Hanna
- · Rueben R. Robinson
- · William Marston Mead
Themes & tags
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