From Brooklyn ’s Master Laughing Gasser: “Dr. Colton’s Dentifrice… for Rigg’s Disease”

In 1844 Gardner Q. Colton administered nitrous oxide while dentist John M. Riggs (1811 to 1885) extracted a molar from his volunteer patient, nitrous-oxide pioneer Dr. Horace Wells. Dr. Riggs would be honored eventually by the dental eponym “Rigg’s disease”; Colton, by his namesake Manhattan firm, the Colton Dental Association (CDA), which provided nitrous oxide for dental anesthesia. When Colton franchised his CDA to Brooklyn, New York, he placed in charge his nephew Edward Gould Colton, M.D. (1841 to 1930). An 1868 graduate of the Bellevue Hospital Medical College, E. G. Colton practiced and lived in Brooklyn for more than 60 yr. Swinging full circle, Dr. E. G. Colton would peddle his own answer (above) to the malady named after Riggs, the first dentist for whom “Uncle Gardner” Colton furnished nitrous oxide. On this 1910s advertisement from the Wood Library-Museum’s Ben Z. Swanson Collection, E. G. Colton, M.D., advertised his own proprietary “Dr. Colton’s Dentifrice” as “A Specific Remedy for Rigg’s Disease (Inflamed Gums, Loosening Teeth) .” (Copyright © the American Society of Anesthesiologists’ Wood Library-Museum of Anesthesiology.)
Source: Anesthesiology - Category: Anesthesiology Source Type: research