After an excellent dinner at a restaurant in Paris, a provincial visitor was unable to pay the bill on discovery that his pocket book had disappeared. He explained his position to the proprietor but the latter, who was recently swindled by an individual who told the same story, refused to take any excuse for non-payment. In order to avoid a scandal, the visitor was obliged to leave his gold-mounted artificial teeth as a guarantee that he would return and pay for his meal.
Source: The Newsletter, Sat 26 June, 1909
High altitude flying reveals dental troubles that elude even the X-ray. Naval doctors found for instance, a naval dive-bomber pilot reported that he was always troubled with severe toothache just before going into a dive. He blamed sinus trouble. But a test in a pressure chamber simulating the atmospheric conditions at high altitude revealed hidden decay that had not been detected by X-rays. Studying an undisclosed number of cases, navy doctors found:
(1) Fifty-seven per cent, of airmen developed toothache in a pressure chamber equivalent to a height’ of 28,000 feet.
(2) Twenty-three per cent, experienced pain at a reading equivalent to 18,000 feet.
(3) Twenty per cent, began showing symptoms before reaching the equivalent of 10,000 feet.
After the hidden decay had been located and repairs carried out, the airmen experienced no further discomfort.
Source: The Daily News, Mon 16 Aug 1943
President Hoover went to the Walter Reed Military Hospital in Washington for dental treatment, and it was found necessary to extract three or four of his teeth. An orderly who was in attendance had the bright idea that there were people who would be willing to pay good money for a President’s teeth, so he gathered them up as soon as Mr. Hoover had left. He not only possessed himself of the Hoover teeth, he also collected all the teeth that had been extracted that day from the jaws of many sufferers by the hospital dentists. The exact number of his collection is not stated, but it was considerable and he had no difficulty in disposing of them all as genuine Hoover teeth at 50 cents. This price he found afterwards was absurdly low, for within a day or two he discovered that they were being sold in the city at several dollars each. Then somebody discovered that there were more teeth on offer than the Hoover household could have supplied, even if every member had visited the dentist and had every tooth extracted. Quotations in the Presidential old teeth market immediately dropped to zero.
Source: Kalgoorlie Miner, Tues 15 September, 1931