Pharmacy roots run deep in Monroe County
Forsyth, Georgia–Jep Castleberry says he never had to wonder what career he would follow when he was growing up in Forsyth.
His father, Jeptha Edgar Castleberry Jr., ran the pharmacy that his father, Jeptha Edgar Castleberry Sr., had owned before him.
“When they had career days at school, I went but didn’t need to. I always knew I’d come home and be the third generation running the drug store one day,” he said. Even when he was finishing Mary Persons High School as a star quarterback under famed coach Dan Pitts and had a chance to go to college on a football scholarship, his future career was a key to choosing a school.
“I was born and raised in a pharmacy family, so I knew wherever I went had to have a pharmacy school. Auburn, South Carolina, Clemson and Georgia Tech were the main ones recruiting me. Auburn and South Carolina had pharmacy schools, so it had to be one of them. The coaches at Clemson and Georgia Tech said I could take classes from other schools in the summer and go on to pharmacy school later. Pepper Rogers almost had me talked into Georgia Tech, but in the end it had to be Auburn because of pharmacy school.”
After graduating in 1980 and a short internship in Pensacola, Fla., Jep Castleberry III returned home to work with his father and mother, Willene, at Castleberry Drug Company.
“That was the plan all along. I had thought about maybe going out to Colorado for a while. I had a friend living in Aspen, and I thought it would be fun for a couple of years to work in a drug store a couple of days a week and be a ski bum the rest of the time. But Dad called and needed me to come home and help him, so I did. That was in 1981, and I’ve been here ever since.”
