It’s the end of a very long era, after Central Drug Store has spent 117 years at its current Mission Street and Santa Rosa Avenue location, it will close permanently on July 15 as owner Jerry Tonelli is heading toward a well-deserved retirement.

There was an outpouring of grief and nostalgia when Mission Local was the first to report three weeks ago that the 117-year-old Central Drug Store in the Excelsior District was closing permanently, effective July 15. Longtime owner Jerry Tonelli announced he was retiring, and no one in the family wanted to take over the family-owned business. As KRON4 notes, Central Drug Store is the oldest retail store in the Excelsior District, and has been at 4494 Mission Street for those entire 117 years.

“It is with a heavy heart that I announce my retirement,” Tonelli wrote on Central Drug Store’s Facebook page in early June. “We are a small, but mighty, pharmacy. And we are proud to say that we outlasted Walgreens, CVS, Rite Aid and mail order services. I am pleased to say this is my choice and I am leaving on my own terms! It is time for all of us to start a new phase in our lives and spend more time with our families.”

Indeed, family has run strong through the pharmacy and retail store for more than a century. As KPIX explains, Tonelli’s father bought the business in 1965 from its previous owner, and his mother worked there too. Tonelli has worked there since high school, taking over the palace after his father’s passing, and the walls are still covered with pictures and mementos from all those years.  

“We’ve had pretty much the same customers over the years, and then their children, and then their children’s children,” Tonelli told the Chronicle. “It’s just a whole cycle of life that we’ve seen come through here, and it’s funny, because after a while it becomes part of your social life.”

This is not your typical Walgreens closure, but instead that of a locally owned, neighborhood-based pharmacy and retail store. But it ties into a similar pattern, as SFGate notes that at least 64 San Francisco pharmacies have closed in the last ten years. But they’re not all gone, and Tonelli recommends that after Central Drug Store closes, people can get their prescriptions filled at Daniel’s Pharmacy, about six blocks south on Mission Street on Geneva Avenue.

Related: Supervisor Fielder Eyes a City-Backed Pharmacy Co-Op Network [SFist]

Image: Jesse Panda C via Yelp