DUANE
Duane's take
Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'm gonna let it do the talking through me. Now, every town's got something it brags about — the biggest this, the oldest that. But Hereford, out here in Deaf Smith County, had something nobody else could claim.
They called it the Town Without a Toothache. And that ain't just a nickname somebody dreamed up one slow afternoon. That's a reputation that went all the way to the American Dental Association.
Here's how it happened. There was a local dentist by the name of Dr. George Heard, originally out of Alabama, who started noticin' something peculiar about his patients — or maybe the more accurate way to put it is, he started noticin' what wasn't there.
Cavities. Tooth decay. Almost nowhere to be found.
So dentists conducted a cross-section survey, and sure enough, few local people had dental cavities. Word of that finding climbed up through the ranks until 1941, when Dr. Edward Taylor, the State Dental Officer, stood before the American Dental Association and told them flat out — tooth decay was almost unknown in Hereford.
The theory, as best as anyone could figure, pointed to the water and the soil. Hereford's mineral-rich water and soil are thought to prevent tooth decay. That's the word: thought.
The marker's honest about what's known and what's believed, and I appreciate that in a good story. But whether it was proven science or West Texas mystery, the rest of the country wasn't waiting around for a research paper. Demand arose — and I mean arose — for Hereford water to be shipped all over the United States and to foreign nations.
People wanted whatever Hereford had in its ground, in its wells, in its cup. Not every town can say its water made the national news and crossed international borders. Hereford can.
What the marker says
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)