St. Joe’s Philadelphia College of Pharmacy held its Founder’s Day event Feb. 19 on the University City campus.
Students, faculty and alums gathered in the Integrated Professional Education Complex to celebrate the 205th anniversary of PCP. Guests enjoyed food, awards and student-led tours through Griffith Hall and the St. Joe’s College of Pharmacy Museum Collection in the Marvin Sampson Museum for the History of Pharmacy.
Emma Gunuey-Marrs, assistant curator and collection manager for the museum, said the annual celebration acts as a way to bring the PCP community together across generations.
“It’s a wonderful excuse to gather different generations of PCP grads and bring people together around the long-standing history of the college,” Gunuey-Marrs said. “I really see that as its primary function, as an opportunity to continue that legacy of community at the college.”
The school was founded in 1821 by a group of 68 apothecaries who met at Carpenters’ Hall in Philadelphia, making PCP the first and oldest college of pharmacy in North America. The group of apothecaries, who were mostly of Quaker faith, aimed to improve safety and standards in the practice of pharmacy, according to the museum’s website.
When the college first opened, students initially purchased tickets to attend classes held in rented spaces and earned their degree alongside an apprenticeship, said Gunuey-Marrs.
The museum was one stop along the student-led tours. Gunuey-Marrs curated displays featuring many different relics, like a 1920s prescription book from a New Jersey pharmacy. She said the items were chosen to create a “bridge between past and present.”
For Charles Peloquin, PharmD ’86, now a professor at the University of Florida, visiting the museum was a chance to connect with the college’s history.
“It’s nice to be back in this building where I certainly spent some quality hours, to say the least,” Peloquin said. “The display from the museum is very interesting and well-presented, so my wife and I both enjoyed what we learned there.”
Meredith Hetrick ’27, PharmD ’29, one of the student tour guides, said the event is an opportunity for current students to meet pharmacy alums.
“I thought meeting alums would maybe help me in that journey [and] find, ‘What can I do in pharmacy?’” Hetrick said. “And honestly, there’s so much. I learn new things every day about what pharmacists can do or can be in careers.”
Gunuey-Marrs said the event carries meaning for the profession moving forward.
“I think that just taking the opportunity to kind of recognize [the Quakers’ contributions] and then look at the long lineage where we are in terms of all of the advances we’ve developed in the field of pharmacy and then also all of the issues that we’re still trying to grapple with,” Gunuey-Marrs said.
Hetrick said Founder’s Day is a “humbling” experience that reminds students of the legacy before them.
“It’s an important thing for students to be a part of it, to remember the history and to feel as though you’re not alone,” Hetrick said. “You’re never alone, and if so many people have done it before, you can do it, too.”
