Orthodontic braces are a common fixture in today’s society and it is not rare to see classmates, coworkers, or family members with braces on their teeth. Both children and adults are often seen wearing braces and there are a wide variety of colors available to allow individual customization of them. Although braces are an everyday part of our culture, little is known about their development or origin. In ancient Greece both scholars Hippocrates and Aristotle talked about ways to fix dentals problems including the straightening of crooked teeth. There are a few men who history considers the fathers of orthodontics and they developed their ideas in the late 19^th century. The first individual is Norman Kingsley who was a writer, artist, and sculptor but was primarily a dentist. In 1880 he wrote “Treatise on Oral Deformities” which was a major influence on dentistry.

Another man deserving credit is Doctor J.N. Farrar who developed the idea of using intermittent mild force to correct dental irregularities in the 1880s. He wrote a couple of books that dealt with his ideas on correcting orthodontic problems. His scientific approach to the biological issues of orthodontics was revolutionary.

Edward Angle, an American dentist from Pennsylvania at the turn of the 20^th century is widely considered the creator of modern orthodontics and his system of classifying dental arches is used all over the world. In 1887 he wrote “Treatment of Malocclusion of the Teeth”. This volume was revised and republished several times and is the cornerstone of modern orthodontics. Angle served as a professor at a couple of medical colleges and in 1900 founded The School of Orthodontia in St. Louis, Missouri. He developed different types of fixed orthodontic appliances that have evolved into the braces and retainers that we are familiar with today. The sophisticated orthodontic systems used currently by most doctors are the result of improvements in technology and owe their development to the pioneering efforts of a few men. The smiles of millions are the result of these efforts.

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Halloween is a celebration we are all familiar with and is often a controversial one as well since various groups disagree with dressing up as monsters and other ghoulish creatures. A lot of organizations prefer to have fall festivals instead of Halloween celebrations believing it is an evil holiday but the history of it tells a different story. Halloween has its origins in the ancient Celtic celebration known as Samhain. It was a festival held at the end of the harvest season and is sometimes regarded as the Celtic New Year. It was a time the Celtic pagans inventoried their supplies and slaughtered livestock in preparation for winter. They also believed that October 31 blurred the lines between the living and the dead. The dead were dangerous to the living and were the cause of illness and crop damage or failure and the Celts wore masks and costumes to placate the spirits.

The term Halloween is a shortened version of All Hallows’ Eve which was the evening of All Hallows’ Day and was a day of northern European pagan festivities which was known as All Saints Day by the church which was a Christian celebration that occurred on May 13 but was moved to November 1^st by a couple of 9^th century popes. The church measured the days as starting at sunset so All Saints Day and Halloween were celebrated on the same day for a while though now All Saints Day is celebrated the day after Halloween since that calendar system has not been used for centuries. Many in the church see it is a demon worshipping holiday but historically it is the day when the living and dead can communicate for a short time. Halloween as we know it was brought to America in 1840 by Irish immigrants fleeing the potato famine in their country.

Some of the traditions and their activities have their roots in historical stories and events. The Romans added some of the Celtic traditions into their own culture and one of those is honoring the goddess Pomona. The symbol of Pomona is an apple which may be an explanation of the modern Halloween tradition of bobbing for apples. Over time the custom of dressing like witches and goblins became more ceremonial than a belief that the dead were actually walking the earth. Trick or Treating is believed to have started as a 9^th century European custom known as souling. On November 2^nd Christians would roam from village to village asking for pieces of bread with currants baked into them known as Soul Cakes. They would promise to say prayers for the recently deceased from any of the people who gave them the cakes and the prayers were believed to help the soul on its way to heaven. The jack-o-lantern is a holdover from Irish legends about a drunkard named Jack who tricked Satan into climbing a tree and carved a cross into the tree trapping Satan. The tale says that Jack died but was not admitted to heaven because of his bad ways and was not let into hell since he had tricked the devil. The devil gave him a glowing ember to light his way which Jack placed in a hollowed turnip to make the light last longer. The Irish used turnips initially as their Jack-o-lanterns but the newly arrived Irish in America found that hollowed pumpkins made better lanterns and they have been a fixture of Halloween since. Halloween has become a large holiday in America from both the economic and social aspects and only gets bigger each year regardless of how it is celebrated.

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We’ve all heard the longstanding tales of alligators running rampant in the sewers of New York City. The logic goes that baby gators were purchased as pets, either in local pet stores or by tourists vacationing in Florida. After quickly outgrowing the confines of their owners’ apartments, they were flushed down toilets and into the sewer system, where they soon bred and infested the labyrinthine network of pipes tunnels beneath Manhattan.

What isn’t largely known, however, is the origin of this famed urban legend, as recorded in the 1920s and 30s by – of all sources — the New York Times. Between 1927 and 1942, the paper ran twelve articles concerning alligator sightings – though in most instances they were in outlying areas beyond the city proper, such as Westchester County and New Jersey, and spotted in rivers or lakes, rather than drainpipes.

The craze got its first shot in the arm on June 28, 1932 when “swarms” of alligators were seen swimming in Bronx River. It was, however, later decided that the witnesses had in fact seen snakes or lizards –- but only after police had reportedly conducted a farcical search involving large quantities of beef liver and butterfly nets.

The sewer component first entered into the myth three years later, after a gang of teenage boys spotted a moving shape beneath them as they shoveled snow into an open manhole cover near the Harlem River. Using a makeshift lasso, they were able to snag the animal’s neck and haul it to surface – where they quickly realized they caught a live alligator. The gator lunged and, in response, the boys beat it to death with their shovels. After dragging the carcass to nearby garage, it was determined that the beast weighed 125 pounds and measured some seven-and-a-half feet in length.

Such up close and personal encounters, however, were few and far between. The legend broke wide in 1959 after the release of Robert Daley’s The World Beneath the City, which detailed the history of New York’s subterranean plumbing and electrical systems. A brief portion of the book recounted the story of Teddy May, the former superintendent of the city’s sewers. According to Mays’s account, after receiving numerous reports of sewer alligators – which he and others believed to be false – he commissioned an investigation in 1935 to squash the stories once and for all.

When no gators turned up, May decided to take a look for himself. Upon visiting an undisclosed location somewhere in the five boroughs, he stumbled upon a so-called “colony” of the creatures – which measured roughly two feet apiece — living in the sewers’ shallow waters. Highly distressed by his discovery, May claimed that he had all of the animals exterminated, though no corroborating account as ever emerged to verify his story.

From then on, embellished stories of an alligator infestation in New York City’s sewers have been propagated far and wide, turning up everywhere from Thomas Pynchon’s 1963 novel V. to a B-side released by British band Radiohead in 2001. Biologists, however, generally doubt the reptiles’ ability to survive a New York City winter and no sewer employee in recent memory has ever reported an encounter with the one of the elusive beasts.

History Collectors: We offer a wide selection of museum quality replicas and authentic items representing nearly every century of the Common Era and the most significant civilizations of ancient history. Once you browse through our online catalogue, we are certain you’ll find the perfect gift for yourself or a loved one with an interest in history.

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We have all been told to “sleep tight” at some point in our lives by a relative and we know they are telling us that they hope we get a good night’s sleep but where does that phrase come from? As with most phrases and sayings there are a couple of different ideas on the actual origin of the phrase and the less exciting one almost always is the most accurate. One of the most widely accepted origins is the days when a mattress was supported on the frame by a series of ropes tied across the frame similar to the hammock we are familiar with. This rope platform would support the mattress which was usually made of straw, pine needles, or reeds and the ropes supporting the bed would loosen and sag over time and they would have to be tightened in order to provide decent sleep. According to some, the ropes would be loosened in order to get rid of guests who had overstayed their welcome. Beds like this did exist which is not in dispute and there are some examples on display at various museums and historical houses. The phrase “sleep tight” referring to making sure the ropes were tight is an explanation often given by tour guides and is supposedly ‘common knowledge’ among historians.

The second explanation is that the phrase “sleep tight” is a holdover from the 18^th and 19^th centuries when tightly meant soundly, well, or properly according to the Oxford English Dictionary. So according to them the saying “sleep tight” is the equivalent of saying sleep well and does not refer to a specific type of bed at all. The phrase appears in the mid-19^th century at a point when the rope style beds were not as common. This explanation is not as interesting or exciting which probably makes it correct since that is the way it seems to work with the phrases we know well but don’t really know where they came from.

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History Collectors: We offer a wide selection of museum quality replicas and authentic items representing nearly every century of the Common Era and the most significant civilizations of ancient history. Once you browse through our online catalogue, we are certain you’ll find the perfect gift for yourself or a loved one with an interest in history.