63 Facts About Eli Lilly

Eli Lilly was a Union Army officer, pharmacist, chemist, and businessman who founded Eli Lilly and Company.

Eli Lilly was later promoted to major and then colonel, and was given command of the 9th Indiana Infantry Regiment.

Eli Lilly was captured in September 1864 and held as a prisoner of war until January 1865.

Eli Lilly remarried and worked with business partners in several pharmacies in Indiana and Illinois before opening his own business in 1876 in Indianapolis.

Eli Lilly's company manufactured drugs and marketed them on a wholesale basis to pharmacies.

Eli Lilly turned over the management of the company to his son, Josiah K Lilly Sr.

Eli Lilly helped found the Commercial Club, the forerunner to the Indianapolis Chamber of Commerce, and became the primary patron of Indiana's branch of the Charity Organization Society.

Eli Lilly personally funded a children's hospital in Indianapolis, known as Eleanor Hospital.

Eli Lilly continued his active involvement with many other organizations until his death from cancer in 1898.

Eli Lilly was an advocate of federal regulation of the pharmaceutical industry, and many of his suggested reforms were enacted into law in 1906, resulting in the creation of the Food and Drug Administration.

Eli Lilly was among the pioneers of the concept of prescriptions, and helped form what became the common practice of giving addictive or dangerous medicines only to people who had first seen a physician.

Eli Lilly he founded has since grown into one of the largest and most influential pharmaceutical corporations in the world, and the largest corporation in Indiana.

Eli Lilly was born on July 8,1838, in Baltimore, Maryland, the first of eleven children born to Gustavus and Esther Eli Lilly.

In 1852, the family settled at Greencastle, Indiana, where Eli Lilly's parents enrolled him at Indiana Asbury University, later renamed DePauw University, where he attended from 1852 to 1854.

Eli Lilly assisted at a local printing press as a printer's devil.

In 1854, while on a trip to visit his aunt and uncle in Lafayette, Indiana, the 16-year-old Eli Lilly visited Henry Lawrence's Good Samaritan Drug Store, a local apothecary shop, where he watched Lawrence prepare pharmaceutical drugs.

Eli Lilly completed a four-year apprenticeship with Lawrence to become a chemist and pharmacist.

In 1858, after earning a certificate of proficiency from his apprenticeship, Eli Lilly left the Good Samaritan to work for Israel Spencer and Sons, a wholesale and retail druggist in Lafayette, before moving to Indianapolis to take a position at the Perkins and Coons Pharmacy.

In 1860, Eli Lilly returned to Greencastle, Indiana, where he worked in Jerome Allen's drugstore.

Eli Lilly opened his own drugstore in the city in January 1861, and married Emily Lemen, the daughter of a Greencastle merchant, on January 31,1861.

In 1861, a few months after the start of the American Civil War, Eli Lilly enlisted in the Union Army and joined the 21st Indiana Infantry Regiment on July 24.

Eli Lilly was commissioned as a second lieutenant on July 29,1861.

Eli Lilly resigned his commission in December 1861, and returned to Indiana to form an artillery unit.

In early 1862, Eli Lilly actively recruited volunteers for his unit among his classmates, friends, local merchants, and farmers.

Eli Lilly had recruitment posters created and posted them around Indianapolis, promising to form the "crack battery of Indiana".

Eli Lilly was elected to serve as the commanding officer of his battery from August 1862 until the winter of 1863, when his three-year enlistment expired.

Several of his artillerymen considered him too young and intemperate to command; however, despite his initial inexperience, Eli Lilly became a competent artillery officer.

Eli Lilly's battery was instrumental in several battles, including the Battle of Hoover's Gap in June 1863, the Second Battle of Chattanooga in August 1863, and the Battle of Chickamauga in September 1863.

Eli Lilly joined the 9th Indiana Cavalry and was promoted to major.

Eli Lilly was promoted to colonel on June 4,1865, and was stationed at Vicksburg, Mississippi, in the spring of 1865 when the Civil War ended.

Eli Lilly later obtained a large atlas, and marked the path of his movements during the Civil War and the location of battles and skirmishes in which he participated.

Eli Lilly often used the atlas when telling war stories.

In 1893, Eli Lilly served as chairman of the Grand Army of the Republic, a brotherhood of Union Civil War veterans.

Eli Lilly traveled to Greencastle, Indiana, and returned with his wife Emily, his sister Anna Wesley Eli Lilly, and son Josiah.

Eli Lilly worked to resolve the situation on the plantation and find other employment while his young son, Josiah, lived with Eli Lilly's parents in Greencastle.

In 1867, Eli Lilly found work at the Harrison Daily and Company, a wholesale drug firm.

In 1869, Lilly left Indiana to open a drugstore with James W Binford, his business partner, opening he Red Front Drugstore in Paris, Illinois, in August 1869.

Eli Lilly and Maria's only child, a daughter named Eleanor, was born on January 25,1871, and died of diphtheria in 1884 at the age of thirteen.

Eli Lilly began formulating a plan to create a medicinal wholesale company of his own.

Eli Lilly left the partnership with Binford in 1873 to return to Indianapolis, where, on January 1,1874, he and John F Johnston opened a drug manufacturing operation called Johnston and Lilly.

Three years later, on March 27,1876, Eli Lilly dissolved the partnership.

On May 10,1876, Eli Lilly opened his own laboratory in a rented two-story building at 15 West Pearl Street that has since been demolished, and began to manufacture drugs.

Eli Lilly products gained a reputation for quality and became popular in the city.

Eli Lilly hired his brother, James, as his first full-time salesman in 1878.

Eli Lilly's business remained at the Pearl Street location from 1876 to 1878, then moved to larger quarters at 36 South Meridian.

In 1890, Eli Lilly turned over the day-to day management of the business to Josiah, who ran the company for thirty-four years.

Eli Lilly flourished despite the tumultuous economic conditions in the 1890s.

In 1894, Eli Lilly purchased a manufacturing plant to be used solely for creating capsules.

Eli Lilly made several technological advances in the manufacturing process, including the automation of capsule production.

At first, Eli Lilly was the company's only researcher, but as the business grew, he established a research laboratory and employed others who were dedicated to creating new drugs.

In 1886, Lilly hired his first full-time research chemist, Ernest G Eberhards, and botanist, Walter H Evans.

Eli Lilly insisted on quality assurance and instituted mechanisms to ensure that the drugs being produced would be effective and perform as advertised, had the correct combination of ingredients, and had the correct dosages of medicines in each pill.

Eli Lilly was aware of the addictive and dangerous nature of some of his drugs, and pioneered the concept of giving such drugs only to people who had first seen a physician to determine if they needed the medicine.

In 1879, with a group of 25 other businessmen, Eli Lilly had begun sponsoring the Charity Organization Society, and soon became the primary patron of its Indiana chapter.

Eli Lilly was interested in encouraging economic growth and general development in Indianapolis.

Eli Lilly attempted to achieve those goals by supporting local commercial organizations financially and through his personal advocacy and promotion.

Eli Lilly shunned public office, preferring to focus his attention on his philanthropic organizations.

Eli Lilly did regularly endorse candidates, and made substantial donations to politicians who advanced his causes.

Eli Lilly's main residence was a large home in Indianapolis on Tennessee Street, renamed Capitol Street in 1895, where he spent most of his time.

Eli Lilly had enjoyed regular vacations and recreation at the lake since the early 1880s.

Eli Lilly developed cancer in 1897 and died in his Indianapolis home on June 6,1898.

Eli Lilly's remains are interred in a large mausoleum at Crown Hill Cemetery in Indianapolis.

Eli Lilly's firm grew into one of the largest pharmaceutical companies in the world.