08/15/2026
This week’s Mayor’s Spotlight is on “Doc” O’Neal — Pharmacist, Mayor, Banker, and Community Servant
For several decades in the middle of the 20th century, it would have been difficult to spend much time in Douglasville without eventually crossing paths with Dr. William S. “Doc” O’Neal.
Born in 1895, O’Neal became one of those citizens whose name seemed to turn up almost everywhere — in business, local government, banking, health care, and community affairs.
Many residents knew him best through O’Neal’s Pharmacy, located at the corner of Broad Street and Price Avenue. This was during the era when doctors routinely made house calls, and Doc O’Neal reportedly sometimes went along with them. His reason was wonderfully practical: if medicine was needed, he could see that the proper prescription was provided without the patient having to wait for someone to make another trip into town.
His service extended well beyond the pharmacy counter.
O’Neal served as mayor of Douglasville from 1952 through 1955 and was a member of the community’s first hospital board. He also became closely associated with Commercial Bank, eventually serving on its board and later being named a Director Emeritus. Commercial Bank would undergo changes through the years before ultimately becoming part of what we know today as Regions Bank.
John Fincher once shared a particularly good memory of Doc O’Neal with me:
“I remember reading my first ticker tape in the store. It was in the back — he apparently loved to play the market.”
That certainly fits with another story told about him. O’Neal reportedly became involved in the leadership of the local bank because he had decided he wasn’t going to leave his money in a bank unless he had some say in how the place was run!
Whether behind the pharmacy counter, accompanying a doctor on a house call, sitting in the mayor’s office, helping guide the hospital, watching the stock market ticker, or serving on the bank board, Doc O’Neal spent much of the 1940s through the 1970s deeply involved in the life of Douglasville and Douglas County.
His name remains part of downtown Douglasville today. The public gathering space between Broad and Church streets became O’Neal Plaza in his honor — a fitting tribute to a man who spent so much of his life at the center of the community.
Doc O’Neal died in 1979 and rests in Douglasville City Cemetery beside his wife, Nell Simpson O’Neal (1898–1976). Also buried there are their sons, Charles Simpson O’Neal (1922–1949), who died in a local airplane crash, and William Bennett O’Neal (1927–1986).
Today, when we walk through O’Neal Plaza, it is easy to think only of the place. But behind that name was a real Douglasville character — pharmacist, mayor, businessman, civic leader, investor, and neighbor.
Dr. William S. “Doc” O’Neal was truly one of Douglas County’s all-star citizens.
>>Please hit SHARE to pass on the history to your friends
