Anna Louise James (January 19, 1886 - 1977) was the first female African American

pharmacist A pharmacist, also known as a chemist (Commonwealth English) or a druggist (North American and, archaically, Commonwealth English), is a healthcare professional who prepares, controls and distributes medicines and provides advice and instructi ...

in Connecticut. She operated the

James Pharmacy The James Pharmacy is a historic building at 2 Pennywise Lane in Old Saybrook, Connecticut. Built in an evolutionary manner beginning about 1820, it is significant as the home and workplace of Anna Louise James (1886–1977), who was the first A ...

Old Saybrook, Connecticut Old Saybrook is a town in Middlesex County, Connecticut, United States. The population was 10,481 at the 2020 census. It contains the incorporated borough of Fenwick, as well as the census-designated places of Old Saybrook Center and Saybro ...

, for fifty years.

Biography

Early life and education

Anna Louise James was born on January 19, 1886, in

Hartford, Connecticut Hartford is the capital city of the U.S. state of Connecticut. It was the seat of Hartford County until Connecticut disbanded county government in 1960. It is the core city in the Greater Hartford metropolitan area. Census estimates since the ...

, to Willis Samuel James and Anna Houston. Willis Samuel James was enslaved on a plantation in

Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth ar ...

, and escaped to Connecticut. Willis James and Anna Houston married in 1874. In 1902, James graduated from Hartford's Arsenal Elementary School. Her family then moved to Old Saybrook, Connecticut, where she attended the local high school and graduated in 1905. Her family was one of the few Black families living in Old Saybrook. James graduated from the

Brooklyn College of Pharmacy The Arnold and Marie Schwartz College of Pharmacy, formerly known as the Brooklyn College of Pharmacy, is a graduate school of Long Island University (LIU)'s Brooklyn Campus. Founded in 1886, it is one of the oldest pharmacy schools in the Unit ...

in 1908, as the first African American woman graduate and the first African American women to be licensed as a pharmacist in Connecticut. After the 19th amendment was passed, legalizing

women's suffrage Women's suffrage is the right of women to vote in elections. Beginning in the start of the 18th century, some people sought to change voting laws to allow women to vote. Liberal political parties would go on to grant women the right to vot ...

, James was one of the first women to register to vote and was very active in the Republican Party.

Career

After graduating from college, James ran a drugstore in Hartford. In 1911, she went to work with her brother-in-law, Peter Lane, at his Lane Pharmacy in Old Saybrook. After Lane left the pharmacy in 1917, James took over the pharmacy, becoming the sole owner in 1922 and renaming it James Pharmacy. James lived upstairs, and kept the pharmacy open every day, with half days on Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year's Day. James made extensive alterations to the pharmacy, which had been originally built in the 1790s as a general store. In 1967, she retired and closed the pharmacy, yet continued to live upstairs until her death in 1977.

Family

James' niece, Ann Lane Petry, is a writer,Clarke, C. (1989, Fall). Retrospective: Ann Petry and the isolation of being other. ''Belles Lettres, 5'', 36. whose

debut novel A debut novel is the first novel a novelist publishes. Debut novels are often the author's first opportunity to make an impact on the publishing industry, and thus the success or failure of a debut novel can affect the ability of the author to p ...

The Street The Street may refer to: Geographical *Wall Street in New York City's Financial District * The Street, Lawshall, Suffolk, England * The Street (Heath Charnock), a building and bridleway in Rivington, Lancashire, England Film and television * ''The ...

'' was the first novel by an African American woman to sell more than a million copies.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:James, Anna Louise People from Old Saybrook, Connecticut American pharmacists 1886 births 1977 deaths People from Connecticut American suffragists