This vivid photo of the old Owl Drug Co. in Pomona was posted by Darin Kuna on his fabulous Growing Up in Pomona in the ’40s, ’50s and ’60s Facebook page.

The view of the storefront was a landscape photo, so large Darin split it in two. (The man’s sleeve is barely visible above on the right, with his complete figure seen below.) Click on either photo for a bigger view.

As the car is said to be a 1938 Plymouth coupe, the photo may date to that year or thereabouts.

The Rexall store was at 102 E. 2nd St., which I believe was the southeast corner of Garey and 2nd. It’s long gone and that lot is now a parking lot.

In the comments on Facebook, Elizabeth Cole said she remembers the store from childhood and “how beautiful” it was. “When you entered it, it had a tobacco counter, made of polished dark wood, with the smell of all kinds of tobacco and pipes with a person selling it inside,” she wrote.

A mysterious sign on the door advertising “Hot Chemm” was explained by Kenny Soper: “Hot Chemm was a vitamin food drink that was sold at drug store fountains. It was something new around the time this photo was taken.”

Another interesting feature is the ramp visible from the sidewalk into the street, meant, Kuna tells me, to allow pedestrians to cross in wet weather without stepping into a puddle or stream of water. Must have made for an obstacle for cars like that Plymouth trying to pull into traffic.

Also, I asked about the striking building visible in the reflection of the sign next to the word “Co.” See that ornate tower?

That, Kuna says, was the Pomona Implement Co., located on the northwest corner of 3rd and Garey, opposite the Fox on the southwest corner and the Mayfair on the northeast corner. He had a photo of that, too. The towers were sheared off in a later remodel and the building was, alas, torn down in the early 1970s. It’s remained a parking lot — there’s a lot of that going around in this post — for the adjacent bank ever since.

How that’s for a blast of Pomona architectural history?

UPDATE: Soper adds via Facebook: “I don’t know if you are aware of it or not, but the 2nd floor of the Pomona Implement Co. building was the location of the Municipal Court. The entrance to the courtroom was through the stairway on the south side (Third St.), which is behind the tree in your photo. One of the judges was Harry Westgate whose home was on the southwest corner of Lincoln and Washington. It was later the home of Jon Provost.”

More proof that everything is connected, or at least everything I’ve ever written about.