1898 - At 27, J. Milton Eckerd opens his first drugstore in Erie, Pa.
1912 - J. Milton opens a store in Wilmington, Del.
1921 - J. Milton and his son-in-law Ed O'Herron open an Eckerd store in Charlotte, N.C.
1940 - J. Milton's youngest son Jack takes a minority stake in two of J. Milton's stores in Erie.
1948 - Jack Eckerd buys two drugstores from his father in Jamestown, N.Y.
1949 - Jack Eckerd opens his first self-serve QuikChek store in Erie.
1952 - Jack Eckerd splits off from his father's business to buy two self-service drugstores in Tampa and a third in Clearwater with $150,000 borrowed from his older half-brother, Ken.
1954 - Jack Eckerd's chain in Florida becomes profitable.
1956 - Eckerd offers senior discounts on prescriptions and two-prints-for-the-price-of-one on photo processing.
1959 - Publix Super Markets switches to Eckerd as its shopping center partner.
1961 - Eckerd raises $2-million from a public stock offering.
1964 - Chain reaches 30 stores; corporate headquarters is moved from Tampa to Clearwater.
1968 - Eckerd buys what becomes JByron's, a moderately priced Miami department store chain.
1969 - Shareholders vote to rename the company Jack Eckerd Corp.
1970 - Eckerd acquires a 40-store chain in Louisiana and Mississippi and a 42-store chain in Texas.
1971 - Eckerd fills its 50-millionth prescription.
1972 - Jack Eckerd buys 20 Eckerd Drug stores in Delaware from J. Milton Hill, his nephew, bringing the total number of stores to 280.
1974 - Jack Eckerd retires. Stewart Turley replaces Harry Roberts as president and chief executive of Eckerd Drug Co.
1977 - With acquisition of Eckerd of North Carolina, the united Eckerd becomes the nation's second largest drugstore chain.
1978 - Jack Eckerd loses his second campaign for governor of Florida.
1980 - Eckerd has 1,072 stores. One share of the initial Eckerd stock is worth $864.
1981 - Eckerd buys a chain of 106 stores selling VCRs and tapes.
1983 - Signs of difficulty emerge as Eckerd's drugstore growth slows, apparel business stagnates and video business continues to lose money.
1984 - Eckerd's drugstore eye-care departments are transformed into a separate chain called Visionworks that offers one-day prescription service
1985 - Dart Group, a Washington, D.C., drugstore and bookstore operator controlled by the quixotic Herbert Haft, launches a hostile takeover bid for Eckerd. Eckerd unloads most of its non-drugstore ventures.
1986 - No white knight rises to save Eckerd from Haft, so Merrill Lynch bankrolls a leveraged-buyout with an Eckerd management group in control. Jack Eckerd sells his last interest in the company.
1989 - Saddled with debt, Eckerd survives as a rare LBO success story, turning its first annual profit since the buyout.
1993 - Eckerd Corp. becomes a publicly traded stock again. Eckerd joins the race to move drugstores out of shopping centers into free-standing locations at major corners.
1997 - J.C. Penney completes its purchase of Eckerd. Combined with its Thrift Drug chain, Eckerd briefly is the nation's second biggest drugstore chain with 2,800 stores.
1999 - Eckerd does so well and J.C. Penney stores so poorly that JCP talks of making Eckerd a separate tracking stock.
2000 - J.C. Penney auditors reveal Eckerd has been under-reporting its inventory losses to shoplifters and employee theft. About 300 stores are closed. New leadership is brought in to fix both JCPenney and Eckerd.
2003 - Rival Walgreens reaps the benefit of flooding Texas and Florida with hundreds of new stores. Sales slump at Eckerd, which opened only a handful over three years.
2004 - J.C. Penney sells Eckerd, six months after auction begins.
SOURCES: Eckerd Corp., Times files, SEC filings, the biography Eckerd: Finding the Right Prescription.
