Collection context
Summary
- Title:
- T. Larkin (Thomas Larkin) Turner Collection,
- Dates:
- 1833-1881
- Creators:
- Turner, T. Larkin (Thomas Larkin), 1812-1897.
- Abstract:
- Ninety-seven items, consisting of legal agreements, letters, and testimonials related to T. Larkin Turner's apothecary business in Boston, and to the patent medicines and soap he manufactured and sold.
- Extent:
- 1 document box (0.5 linear ft)
- Language:
- Collection materials in English
- Preferred citation:
-
[Identification of item], T. Larkin (Thomas Larkin) Turner collection (Manuscript collection 329). Louise M. Darling Biomedical Library History and Special Collections for the Sciences, University of California, Los Angeles.
Background
- Scope and content:
-
A chronological list compiled by the bookseller (see Folder 1) itemizes each document with date, name of correspondent, and a short indication of content. The item numbers used in this Finding Aid's Container List refer to the items of the bookseller list. The content is separated into legal and informal contracts and agreements, items concerning the pharmacy and its medicines, some personal items, and plans for the manufacture of soap.
- Biographical / historical:
-
T. (Thomas) Larkin Turner (1812-1897) was born in Charlestown, Massachusetts to a family tracing its ancestry back to 1630s Plymouth. Educated first at Harvard, he left to study medicine with Dr. Hurd of Charlestown; he was first listed as a druggist in the Boston Directory in 1839. Turner's father was Capt. Larkin Turner, a shipmaster for 40 years who served two terms in the Massachusetts legislature after his retirement from the sea. The young Turner sailed on his father's ships "Henry" and "Palestine" in 1834 and 1835. Then for the next two years he served as draftsman and surveyor for the Brunswick and Florida Railroad in Georgia and Florida.
As the earliest items in this collection indicate, by November 1837 Turner was signing papers for a partnership to acquire and run a pharmacy in Boston. He headed this business for approximately the next forty years, manufacturing and marketing proprietary and other patent medicines and, starting about 1852, soap. The firm of Turner and Co. was first listed in 1867.
Turner became a member of the Massachusetts College of Pharmacy in 1851 and served as one of the College's representatives to the 1852 National Pharmaceutical Convention, which established the American Pharmaceutical Association. He also belonged to the Massachusetts Pharmaceutical Society and the Massachusetts Historical and Genealogical Societies, and the Knights Templar of the Masonic Order. He was a visitor for the Boston Provident Association, a charity for the poor, and compiled a 45 p. catalog of the clients it served; in 1853 he authored a memoir of the Rev. Edward Turner, an ancestor. In 1843 he married Elizabeth Devina of Hingham, Mass.
- Acquisition information:
- Purchased from aGatherin', West Sand Lake, N.Y., in June 2011.
- Physical location:
- Cage, History and Special Collections for the Sciences, Louise M. Darling Biomedical Library, UCLA
- Rules or conventions:
- Finding aid prepared using Describing Archives: A Content Standard
Indexed terms
About this collection guide
- Date Prepared:
- ©2012
- Date Encoded:
- Machine-readable finding aid derived from ColdFusion web application and SQLServer relational database. Date of source: 2012
Access and use
- Restrictions:
-
Collection is open for research.
- Terms of access:
-
Property rights in the physical objects belong to the UCLA Biomedical Library. Literary rights, including copyright, are retained by the creators and their heirs. It is the responsibility of the researcher to determine who holds the copyright and pursue the copyright owner or his or her heir for permission to publish if the Biomedical Library does not hold the copyright.
- Preferred citation:
-
[Identification of item], T. Larkin (Thomas Larkin) Turner collection (Manuscript collection 329). Louise M. Darling Biomedical Library History and Special Collections for the Sciences, University of California, Los Angeles.
- Location of this collection:
-
Louise M. Darling Biomedical Library12-077 Center for Health Sciences, Box 951798Los Angeles, CA 90095-1798, US
- Contact:
- (310) 825-6940