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First Posted: 10/24/2013 EDITOR&#8217;S NOTE: This story first appeared in The Dallas Post on Oct. 20. Because the story contained inaccuracies, we are re-printing it here in its entirey.
The early 1960s were notable years for Dominic Fino. His father died, he got married and, in 1963, he bought an historic building in the center of Dallas that has been the site of his family&#8217;s business for the last 50 years.
Looking out the second-floor window of the building re-built in 1894 after a fire, Fino tells the story.
&#8220;I remember my mother-in-law wanted to drive around with me to see the building because she had worked for Col. Reynolds. She lived in Pittston and would take the trolley from there to Wilkes-Barre and then to Dallas center where the Reynolds would pick her up at this store.&#8221;
But Fino, 78, whose father Pasquale (Patrick) owned a thriving family pharmacy on Main Street in Pittston (still operated by fino&#8217;s nephew, Vincent Peck), was not impressed as he drove around the area.
&#8220;It was all farmland. There was nothing here until you came to Dallas. I wondered where all the business was going to come from and where all the people were. I was not sure,&#8221; he recalled.
&#8220;I wanted to branch out on my own.&#8221; He put aside some of his fear when an area drug supplier from Scranton offered to show him past stores receipts for drug supplies in Dallas and gave him backing in the form of credit toward drugs and supplies.
The building Fino chose in the center of Dallas had been operating as a drug store since before 1913 and was owned by the Odd Fellows and operated as a pharmacy by the Kuehn family, who lived nearby on Church Sreet.
Other early pharmacists in Dallas that Fino mentioned were C.H Hall, Walter Harter, George Norton and a man named Roberts. These names also appear in the D.A. Waters, &#8220;History of Dallas,&#8221; as does Fino&#8217;s name.
Fino bought the two- story structure that Toby&#8217;s Creek runs under and continued to accommodate the meetings of the local chapter of the Odd Fellows International on the second floor. The group still conducts its meetings there.
So for the past 50 years, Fino, with help from Bob Wilson, Polly Bobersky and Sister Chasena Erzal, a Sister of Mercy, his family and many others from the community, the Finos have dispensed drugs and even ran a soda fountain in the building.
&#8220;In those days, every pharmacy had a soda fountain,&#8221; mentions Fino.
The soda fountain is gone, some of the antiques remain, but the competition is fierce in an industry that, while still growing under the weight of the baby boomer generation, has seen four or five new super drug stores open in the Back Mountain. Yet, the store delivers prescriptions to the home and offers a store credit line to customers.
Dominic Sr. is now semi-retired and his two sons, Michael and Dominic Jr. help with the family business. His granddaughter, Sarah Brassington, works there, also. Fino also has a daughter, Leanne.
Michael Fino, 40, who grew up washing gallon glass bottles that held cough syrup and tonics for the stomach, is the third generation of Fino men to have graduated from the Philadelphia College of Pharmacy and Science in Philadelphia. (now called the University of the Sciences). The first was his grandfather, Pasquale (Patrick) Fino, deceased, originally from Europe.
&#8220;My father and I went to my father&#8217;s 50th reunion - there were only two women in that class - and my15th reunion. We had some of the same teachers, including the man who invented Trident gum,&#8221; says the younger Fino.
Michael Fino met his wife, Mary Beth, while in pharmacy school. The couple has three children, Ava, Mia and Michael.
He tells the story of the man who came in the pharmacy, put his hat on the counter and asked for a prescription for pink-eye. &#8220;I gave him something for it but he said, &#8216;No, this isn&#8217;t for me; it&#8217;s for my cow.&#8217; I told him it would take a while to figure that one out.&#8221;
Serving the community for all these years, the younger Fino says, &#8220;It&#8217;s been humbling - the community has been good to us and we really appreciate it.&#8221;
A member of Gate of Heaven Church and a resident of Dallas and married to Ruth Fino, Dom Fino advises, &#8220;Don&#8217;t look back over your shoulder, do the right thing, just do what you think is right.&#8221; It&#8217;s been his mantra through life and seems to have worked.

Fino’s Pharmacy has been serving BMT customers for 50 years