THANKSGIVING SHOCKER: PILGRIMS HAD BAD BREATH, NO TEETH

THANKSGIVING SHOCKER: PILGRIMS HAD BAD BREATH, NO TEETH

PHOENIX (Wireless Flash) -- There may have been a good reason why pilgrim Miles Standish was too shy to talk with Priscilla: Bad breath. According to Phoenix-based dentist Dr. Eric Curtis, the early pilgrims were real turkeys when it came to taking care of their teeth. In fact, one colonial remedy for a toothache was to apply a frog's thigh bone to the tooth. Pilgrim men considered oral hygiene unmanly while the ladies just rubbed their teeth with the hem of their skirt or a twig -- which caused many pilgrim women to become toothless hags by age 18. By comparison, Curtis says native Americans like Pocahontas reportedly had strong teeth as white as snow -- mainly because their diet had no refined sugar.