The auction-house staffer was nonchalant, but we two auction-goers were astounded.
I had seen them first: sets of false teeth with pink gums attached to heavy metal plates in a glass case with other items. They didn’t seem like the kind of dentures you’d get from a Dentist in Turlock these days, that’s for sure. The false teeth were the first thing that caught my eye as I previewed items for sale, and I immediately asked to see the case. The sets of falsies were thankfully in a box so I didn?t have to touch them. I wouldn?t have anyway, because they were a mess.
As I expressed my amazement, another auction-goer standing close by began eyeing them.
The auction-house staffer smiled amusedly and gave us only one answer: “Everything shows up at auction,” he said.
I?ve been to enough auctions to know that he was right. In fact, this wasn?t the first sets of false teeth I?d seen before. Some years ago, I came across a bunch of partial dentures in a gallon-size Ziploc bag. They were attached to metal bridges that were the color of silver.
Both times, I was incredulous and wondered who would buy them. This time, one person had left an orange absentee-bid sticker on the case. I wasn?t sure if the buyer wanted the teeth or the brass pulley or the police badge or the Farm Bureau tag or everything in the case.
At the previous auction, two bidders went at it for the partial dentures, which sold for $15. I was sure that these recent ones would also sell and be resold as a novelty.
The false teeth were held together by thick pieces of metal, indicating to me that they were mighty old. That also made me curious about the history behind false teeth.
They are said to date back to Mexico in 2500 BC and were made of wolf teeth. In 700 BC Italy, they were fashioned from animal and human teeth. In Japan starting in the 16th century, they were made of wood. By the 18th century, some were made of human and animal teeth, and carved ivory. At one point, a man-made material was also used.
Only people with money could afford false teeth. For poor people, I?m sure, decayed teeth just fell out. In fact, most people had their teeth pulled, and some folks sold their good teeth to dentists.
Queen Elizabeth I of England had problems with her teeth. She loved sweets and ate too much of it, causing hers to blacken, decay and fall out. Many foreign dignitaries could hardly understand her when she spoke. During her reign in the 16th century, dentures made of ivory had not yet been developed.
In the United States, the most famous person who wore dentures was George Washington, who had some trying times with his teeth, too. He was in constant pain all of his life.
Washington did not wear wooden dentures. His first set was a partial denture made of ivory. Later, another dentist made full dentures out of hippopotamus ivory and human teeth for him to wear to his inauguration. The dentist left a hole in the dentures for the president?s last good tooth, which Washington later gave him as a thank-you gift.
Washington complained that the false teeth were not comfortable and forced his mouth to bulge. Some of his dentures have survived; a complete set made of animal and human teeth, lead and ivory can be found at Mount Vernon.
Washington obtained some of those human teeth from the mouths of enslaved Africans on his plantation ? either forcibly, as some assert, or by paying for them at prices much lower than what others were paid. In one of his account books, he wrote that he purchased nine teeth from enslaved Africans.
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