 After completing graduate school in 1952, Simmons worked for the U.S. government as a bank examiner, then for a Dallas-based bank, Republic National Bank.In 1960, using $5,000 of his savings, and a $95,000 loan, he bought a small drugstore, University Pharmacy on Hillcrest Avenue, across from the campus of Southern Methodist University.Before Simmons owned it, University Pharmacy was the site of a racially charged sit-in in January 1961, when its owner C.K.