Address
3 Tilto St.,
LT-89492, Vieksniai,
Mazeikiai district
Telephone nr. +370-443-37420.
Information
for Visitors
Working hours: Tuesday -
Friday 9 a.m. - 5 p.m.
Saturday 9 a.m. - 4 p.m.
Exposition
The museum of Vieksniai pharmacy is a
museum - chemist’s shop. In this building, the exposition of the former
pharmaceutist’s J. Aleksandravicius daily house life is also presented.
The founder of the museum is the municipality of Akmene district.
The exposition is continually renewed. In the future it should be enriched
with new exhibits and considerably enlarged. The workers of a museum
-chemist’s - V.Lizdenis and D.Konciene - pleasantly welcome visitors.
One of the rarest exhibits of the museum is the straps for human skin,
earlier used for curing wounds and ulcers.
About
the Pharmacy of Vieksniai
The museum of Vieksniai Pharmacy
is established in a wooden building situated in the centre of the town. In
1859 the pharmaceutical chemist Theodore von Geldner, who had arrived form
Telsiai to Vieksniai, bought this building and adapted it for pharmacy
business. During these times, the pharmacy prospered, but Theodore von
Geldner started supporting the rebels of 1863 revolt, and consequently had
suffered because of that. As a result, his pharmacy business deteriorated.
In 1870 Theodore von Geldner died, and the pharmacy was sold by auction.
Having
purchased the pharmacy, Vincent Aleksandravicius transformed it into an
exemplary institution. For many years Vieksniai pharmacy has been a good
practice centre for the students of pharmaceutics. The pharmacy stores a
recipe for furuncles that had been prescribed for Simonas Daukantas, a
famous Lithuanian writer. A frequent visitor of the pharmacy was the
doctor J.Birziska, as well as other intellectuals of Vieksniai. The last
owner of the pharmacy, Juozas Aleksandravicius, had enlarged the pharmacy
base: he collected many old pharmaceutical instruments, apparatus and
necessary equipment.
For a long time the local people considered the pharmacy to be ‘magical’.
In 1915 a Vieksniai suffered a huge fire that destroyed the whole town but
the pharmacy: the fire stopped beside the building. For the inhabitants of
Vieksniai this was a true miracle. During the WWII another ‘miracle’
had happened: the fragments of cracked shells holed all the pharmacy’s
premises, one corner of the building was demolished, the roof was torn
down by a grenade, yet the pharmacy remained unharmed. The second huge
fire that had stormed in Vieksniai did not strike the ‘magical’
building either. In 1995, after the restoration a museum - chemist’s
shop was brought into operation in the former building of the pharmacy.
