Dr. Robert Withers Morgan (1844-1904)

Q-6-32

Dental innovator Dr. Robert W. Morgan lived here. Troubled by the lack of dental care for soldiers while he served in the Confederate army, he studied dentistry after the war. During the 1880s he formulated dental hygiene products including Dental Chewing Gum, Dental Chewing Tobacco, and Dental Scotch Snuff, which were manufactured in Lynchburg. Working with Rep. Peter Otey, Morgan drafted preliminary legislation that was the basis for congressional approval in 1901 of the first contract dentists to serve the U.S. Army. He was one of three members appointed to the Army's first Board of Dental Examiners.

Department of Historic Resources, 2015

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References/Bibliographic Citation:

A History of Dentistry in the U.S. Army to World War II (http://www.cs.amedd.army.mil/borden/Portlet.aspx?id=8d4d44d2-2ce9-4b0c-9845-68294087baa0) Army Medical Department website (http://history.amedd.army.mil/corps/dental/dental.html) Highlights in the History of U.S. Army Dentistry (http://history.amedd.army.mil/corps/dental/DCHighlights2012.pdf) National Register nomination for Centerview Robert Merchant, “Dr. Robert Withers Morgan: Lynchburg’s Pioneer Dentist,” Lynch’s Ferry (spring/summer 2002), 19-22. Robert Palmer Stickley and Jack David Amowitz, "The Lynchburg Dental Society Presents One Hundred and Forty-Three Years of Dentistry, 1820-1963" (1964). Walter D. Vail, "Organization of the Dental Corps" (http://history.amedd.army.mil/corps/dental/general/vail.html).