THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, May 22, 1996 TAG: 9605220222
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B3 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY LINDA MCNATT, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: SMITHFIELD LENGTH: 88 lines
Dr. J. Wilson Ames Jr. is celebrating 100 years in dentistry today. At 61, that's not an easy trick.
But Ames' anniversary includes not only his career but that of his grandfather and his father. Three generations of Ameses have practiced in the same spot on Smithfield's Main Street since 1896.
That's not quite as rare as hen's teeth, according to the Virginia Dental Association, but almost. There are two other third-generation dentists practicing in the state, one a recent graduate.
Clarence Walter Ames was only 20 - just finished with two years of school at the Baltimore College of Dentistry - when his brother, who was in Norfolk at the time, wrote to tell him about a small town in Isle of Wight County that needed a dentist. At the time, a dentist from Richmond was visiting the town twice a month.
``If you come to Smithfield, you will strike a snap,'' Charles Ames said in the letter dated Dec. 3, 1896. ``You can make $100 before Christmas.''
Charles promised Walter a ``great opportunity,'' and that he would ``always be paid in cash.''
That wasn't the case when J. Wilson Ames Sr. joined the practice in 1931. Then, during the Depression, his son said, the dental team was paid in produce, chickens and eggs, and ``They were glad to get it,'' Ames Jr. said.
The only way his father made it through five years of school at the Medical College of Virginia was through the sale of puppies from a breeded hunting dog the elder Ames had imported from England.
``Old Lou's pups, even during the Depression, were selling for $50 a piece before they were born,'' the surviving Dr. Ames said. ``Pappy always said Old Lou put him through school.''
Wilson Ames Jr. followed in his father's footsteps through MCV. By that time, eight years of schooling were required for a degree in dentistry.
For 100 years, the Ameses of Smithfield have made their impressions on the profession.
In 1907, after visiting the Jamestown Exposition, where he saw another dentist casting a gold tooth, the first Dr. Ames returned home and, using a mainspring from a clock, invented a machine that used centrifugal force for casting dental gold. It was a first, and the machine today is at MCV.
His grandfather, Ames said, went through more than half of his career without the benefit of anesthetics.
``He lived until I was about 15,'' Ames said. ``He told me his patients would stop by the drugstore and get a shot of whiskey before they came to see him. He called it `a shot of courage.' ''
In 1939, Ames' father invented a 30-treatment method of removing fluoride stains from teeth. He wrote about it in the Virginia Dental Journal. A simplified version of the same method is still used today.
The first Ames dentist practiced until he died after breaking his leg at age 76. The broken leg didn't kill him, his grandson said. The weight of the cast did him in. It put too much strain on his heart after he refused to get off the leg and quit working.
The second Ames died at 71, just a few months after he quit practicing because of an arterial disease.
Both of them left to the current Dr. Ames old dental tools, correspondence, records, photos of that first fluoride stain removal - before and after. All of it will be on display today in Ames' office.
But they left more than that, Dr. J. Wilson Ames Jr. said. They left a legacy of appreciation for the work and a zest for continuous education.
Ames recalls he was about 9 years old when his grandfather first paid him to watch the temperature of a pot ``fixing'' dentures, a kind of a pressure cooker used for the job. Depending on how long he had to stand guard, with his grandfather by his side promoting the dental profession, Ames said he made from 10 to 25 cents.
While his grandfather encouraged the third generation dentist, his father pointed out the negatives of the profession, Ames said.
``I think Pappy wanted to make sure I made the right decision. He'd always start with, `When you deal with the public. . .' ''
Both men made it clear that he should never stop learning.
And Ames remembers one year in particular, soon after he started his Smithfield practice, when he told his father he didn't intend to go to an annual meeting. He told him he couldn't afford it.
``My father looked at me and said, `You can't not afford it.'' He told me I would learn more from meeting and talking with other dentists than I would ever learn anywhere else. In all of his years, he missed one state dental meeting, no homecomings.''
Although there is no fourth generation Dr. Ames in sight, Wilson Ames Jr. has two teenage stepsons still undecided about their careers.
``I guess I can always hope,'' he said. ``You never know.'' ILLUSTRATION: Photo
JOHN H. SHEALLY II/The Virginian-Pilot
Dr. J. Wilson Ames Jr., 61, with patient Tony Powell, has followed
in his father's and grandfather's footsteps on Smithfield's Main
Street. by CNB