Most people in the Lower 9th Ward didn’t call my father a pharmacist. They called him Mr. Henry.
Sterling J. Henry, Sr., RPh, opened H&W Drug Store in 1963 alongside his partner, Wesley J. Watkins, RPh, at Caffin Avenue and North Galvez Street. The name was simple, “H” for Henry, “W” for Watkins. Two pharmacists, one neighborhood.
My dad was a graduate of Xavier University of Louisiana, and he never stopped giving back to that school. From the early 1960s onward, he mentored Xavier pharmacy students and offered them internships at his store. In 2022, U.S. Representative Troy Carter entered a tribute into the Congressional Record honoring our family. He described my father as “a pioneer black pharmacist, responsible for integrating the workforce of the historic Tremé’s Circle Food Store.” That was him. He wasn’t just filling prescriptions. He was making room for people.
Mr. Watkins passed away in 1990. My dad kept the store going. He finally retired in 1999, and that’s when I took over.
I graduated from Xavier’s College of Pharmacy in 1985, same school, same path. Taking over H&W wasn’t something I took lightly. That store had been part of this community for nearly 40 years by the time I stepped in. People trusted it. They trusted my father. That doesn’t transfer automatically. You have to earn it every single day.
Then came 2005.
Katrina shut us down. The neighborhood we’d served for over 40 years was underwater. We lost the store. Many people lost much more. But we weren’t done. On November 1, 2011, we reopened inside the USA Market in New Orleans East. Six years after the storm, H&W was back open.
We kept going from there. A Westbank location at Budget Saver on Barataria Boulevard in Marrero. Then, on August 27, 2018, our first standalone pharmacy since Katrina opened at 7240 Crowder Boulevard in New Orleans East — that one meant a lot to me. In 2020, we opened inside the Circle Food Store on St. Bernard Avenue in the Tremé, a neighborhood with deep roots for my father, going back decades.
In 2018, the Louisiana Board of Pharmacy chose H&W to operate the first medical marijuana pharmacy in the New Orleans metro area. When a reporter asked me why we got selected, I said it straight: “This company has been in business for over 50 years in the New Orleans community.” That history, the one my father and Mr. Watkins built before I ever touched a prescription, is what made that possible.
My dad passed away on July 12, 2016. He was 79. The guest book on his obituary page was filled with stories from people in the Lower 9th Ward. One woman, Adrienne Smith Dowden, wrote about Christmas 1966. Her little sister’s doll broke. Her mother brought it to my dad at H&W. He took it to the back, fixed it (it just needed batteries), and then came back out with a baby doll stroller, telling the little girl that Santa had left it there for her. The sister was so happy. Adrienne wrote: “That’s just one of many stories we have. He was always very nice and kind.”
That’s the store I’m running. That’s what I’m trying to hold onto.
We’re at Crowder Boulevard, Barataria Boulevard, and St. Bernard Avenue. Come see us.
Ruston Henry, RPh
Owner & Chief Pharmacist, H&W Drug Store
