Edward Angle facts for kids

Edward Hartley Angle (June 1, 1855 – August 11, 1930) was an American dentist. He is known as "the father of modern orthodontics". Orthodontics is the special field of dentistry that deals with fixing teeth and jaws that are not straight.

Edward Angle was trained as a general dentist. But he chose to focus his life on orthodontics. He worked to make sure that the teaching and practice of orthodontics were the same everywhere. He started the Angle School of Orthodontia in St. Louis. He also opened schools in other parts of the United States.

Early Life and Education

Edward Angle was born in Herricks, New York, in 1855. He was one of seven children. Even as a child, he was good at working with tools and machines.

He went to high school in Canton, Pennsylvania. Before going to dental school, he worked for a local dentist from 1874 to 1876. He then studied at the Pennsylvania College of Dental Surgery. He became a dentist in 1878.

Moving and Teaching

After becoming a dentist, Angle started working in Towanda, Pennsylvania. In 1881, he had some health problems. This made him move to Minnesota for a few months. When he felt better, he returned to Pennsylvania.

In 1886, he became a teacher at the University of Minnesota School of Dentistry. He taught about anatomy and orthodontics. At the same time, he also had his own dental practice.

Edward Angle's first interest was in making artificial teeth (prosthodontics). He taught this subject in dental schools in the 1880s. But soon, his focus shifted to orthodontics.

Becoming an Orthodontics Expert

In 1887, Edward Angle published a paper that became his first book on orthodontics. He published seven editions of this important book. In 1888, he became the President of the Minneapolis City Dental Society.

By 1892, he decided to focus only on orthodontics. He stopped working as a general dentist. He published his third book, called "The angle system of regulation and retention of teeth." This book helped dentists learn how to straighten teeth.

He moved to St. Louis, Missouri, with his assistant, Anna Hopkins. He later married Anna Hopkins in 1908. Anna was also a dentist. They worked together on his school and research.

Founding Modern Orthodontics

In 1899, Edward Angle taught a special course on orthodontics. His students encouraged him to create a school just for this field. So, in 1900, he founded the Angle School of Orthodontia in St. Louis, Missouri. This was a big step in making orthodontics a separate and important part of dentistry.

Angle gave orthodontics a new start. He created the word malocclusion. This word describes when teeth or jaws don't line up correctly. He also made a system to classify different types of malocclusion. This helped dentists understand and treat these problems better.

He also invented many appliances (tools) to fix crooked teeth. He wrote books and guides to standardize these tools. His most famous book was Treatment of Malocclusion of the Teeth and Fractures of the Maxillae: Angle's System.

Angle's classification system for malocclusion was very important. It not only described different types of bad bites but also clearly defined what a "normal" bite should look like.

Edward Angle also cared about how teeth looked, not just how they worked. He worked with an artist named Edmund H. Wuerpel. They explored how art and beauty could be used in orthodontics. Wuerpel often gave talks at Angle's school.

Angle's work led to the creation of "The Angle Orthodontist" journal in 1930. This is the official magazine of the Edward H. Angle Society of Orthodontists. He also founded the Society of Orthodontists in 1901, which later became the American Society of Orthodontists.

Edward Angle held 46 patents for his inventions.

Important Appliances

Edward Angle invented several key appliances that changed orthodontics.

Upper and Lower Jaw Functional Expanders

• E (expansion) Arch Appliance (1907) - This was one of his first appliances. It helped to widen the dental arch. However, it mostly just tipped the teeth and didn't offer much control over each tooth's position.
• Pin & Tube Appliance (1910) - This appliance used gold and platinum bands on all teeth. Small vertical tubes were attached to these bands. Pins were put through the tubes to move teeth. It was hard to make tooth roots straight or rotate teeth with this device. Also, the pins had to be re-soldered often.
• Ribbon Arch Appliance (1915) - This came after the Pin and Tube appliance. It had a vertical bracket (a small part that holds the wire) soldered to a band. This design made it possible to rotate teeth. Later, Dr. Raymond Begg used ideas from this appliance to create his own technique.
• Edgewise Appliance (1925) - This was a very important invention. It used similar brackets for all teeth. It allowed teeth to move in all directions (up, down, forward, backward, and sideways) by bending a rectangular wire. The wire was held in the bracket by a metal tie. In this appliance, the slot for the wire was changed from vertical to horizontal. This bracket was wide and had a specific slot size. It was sometimes called "open face" or "tie brackets."
  • The edgewise bracket has been changed and improved many times since then.

Later Life and Death

Edward Angle moved to Pasadena, California, in 1917 due to health reasons. He opened his school there in a new home.

He died in 1930 in Santa Monica, California, at the age of 75. He passed away from heart failure. He is buried in Mountain View Cemetery in Altadena, California.