Town Without a Toothache

The dentist behind the slogan came to doubt it. George W. Heard, born in Alabama in 1867, saw how sound his Hereford patients' teeth were; Edward Taylor of the Texas Department of Health began a two-year study in 1939 that found the lowest rate of tooth decay among schoolchildren of any American city, with about one part per million of fluoride in the water, the level later standard for artificial fluoridation. Ripley's Believe It or Not and Collier's spread the phrase in 1942. In a 1954 letter Heard called it untrue, a phrase used to sell sodium fluoride.

What the plaque says

Town Without a Toothache Hereford's "miracle water" was brought to national fame in 1941 when Dr. Edward Taylor, State Dental Officer, told the American Dental Association that tooth decay was almost unknown here. This ideal situation had been discovered by a local dentist, Dr. George Heard, originally from Alabama. In a cross-section survey, dentists found that few local people had dental cavities. Hereford's mineral-rich water and soil are thought to prevent tooth decay. Demand arose for Hereford water to be shipped all over the U.S. and to foreign nations. (1967)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Deaf Smith County Historical Museum — 0.5 mi
  Hereford's county museum in an early Catholic school: the Windmill City's pioneers, a half-dugout and caboose outside, and work by the Italian prisoners held south of town in the war.
• Buffalo Lake National Wildlife Refuge — 18 mi
  A 1938 Depression-era lake on Tierra Blanca Creek that has gone dry, now 7,664 acres of shortgrass, cottonwood canyon and a prairie dog town on the High Plains south of Umbarger.

More markers nearby

• Two-Wheel Fire Hose Reel — 0.4 mi
• Deaf Smith County — 0.4 mi
• Pioneer Windmill — 0.5 mi
• Mothers Park — 0.5 mi