Lucien Anker
Lucien Anker, pharmacist
When I was four or five we used to live in Bulle. My mother worked in a pharmacy. I was very afraid of thunderstorms. I used to see the garden, which my father maintained lovingly, torn to pieces by enormous hailstones. I said to myself that if ever I were to become a pharmacist I could live where I worked !
At fourteen I was allowed to ride about on a Solex motorised bicycle. I was an errand boy for the pharmacy where my mother worked, and this contributed to my interest in taking up this profession. But what really gave me the taste for this career was an 18-month internship, working for a pharmacist in Montreux, who not only taught me the ethics of my trade but also put me in contact with various jazz musicians, performing at the Montreux Jazz Festival, whilst my supervisor was minding the first-aid post.
Do you know many of the people who had the honour of massaging the ankles of Miles Davis ?
Interested as I was in chemistry, I indeed became a pharamcist : four years as an assistant at university and then ten years as a cantonal pharmacist. My mother had helped my brother Claude-Alain, also a pharmacist, to open the Diablerets Pharmacy and I joined them.
What do you like about your profession ?
Contact with people, and also the mixture of chemistry, physics and medicine.
Is that because you still make up medicines ?
Yes, mainly for dermatologists and paediatricians, who demand ointments without preserving agents which can sometimes cause allergies, and also specialities for infants which don’t exist for this age group.
Pharmacie des Diablerets Anker SA
Route de la Gare
1865 Les Diablerets
024 492 32 83
Translation : Gordon Douglas