Richard H. McDonald, in addition to being a druggist and businessman, was also the president of the Pacific Bank in San Francisco. He was closely associated with a product called Vinegar Bitters, touted as the only "temperance" bitters.
…The death of Dr. McDonald recalls the sensational incidents surrounding the failure of the Pacific Bank (in San Francisco)and the People’s Home Savings Bank in this city in 1893. The crash of these two concerns and the resulting disclosures of wholesale fraud involving Dr. McDonald, his two sons Richard H. McDonald Jr. and Frank McDonald, and other men high in financial and political circles of the community formed the most startling sensation in the history of finance on the coast.
On June 22, 1893, the Pacific Bank suspended payment and on November 3 it was declared insolvent. A terrific run immediately commenced on the People’s Home Savings Bank, and it also soon went under, carrying ruin to hundreds of poor depositors.
President McDonald and R.H. McDonald Jr. were indicted by the grand jury and made to stand trial. Frank McDonald fled to Japan. In both instances the alleged offenders were released upon technical grounds after sensational trials. Dr. McDonald, who was considered more the unfortunate dupe of his two sons than an active offender, could not face the shame of the sensational incident and left the city for Cuba, never to set foot on his native land again.