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14 Harold Gladstone Watkin 1882-1965 Pioneering Orthodontist of the Twentieth Century SV Freeman∗ Early Years Harold Gladstone Watkin was born in on 17 January 1882 in Burslem, Stoke on Trent. He lived with his father, James, an architect, his mother, Isabella (nee Ball) and his sister Sarah-Jane who was commonly known as Dotty because of her diminutive size. Harold himself only grew to 4 feet 11 inches. At the time the potteries were a thriving part of the UK and Harold enjoyed a comfortable lifestyle. Then, in 1892, disaster struck the family as his father suffered heatstroke whilst inspecting the roof of a building, fell off and was killed, aged 38. Isabella took the two children to live with her widowed father Henry George Ball so that she could act as housekeeper. Henry was a successful businessman with a background in the chemical and Pharmaceutical industry and had owned a chemist shop in the centre of Burslem. Henry had retired a wealthy man in 1889 at the age of 50 and became Mayor of Burslem. Henry’s home was Claremont House and was a fine residence in Longport, Stoke-on-Trent. It was in this house that Watkin spent his formative teenage years. As the family was Methodist, Watkin was sent to the High School in Hanley. He excelled at his work, especially in Physics. Despite this prowess at school his Grandfather made him leave at 15 because, he had left school at that age and he saw no reason why it should be any different for his grandson, so in 1897 Watkin left Hanley High School at 15 without matriculating and embarked on his career. As a young man he used to enjoy dancing and ice-skating and also went sailing with his next-door neighbours who were in the Pottery business, and would take Watkin to Burnham Crouch on the East coast. He acquired a motorbike with a basket woven sidecar. Then roads were un-metalled, very dusty and usually surfaced in limestone chippings and a common sight was of a large cloud of dust thrown up by a distance vehicle. To protect themselves any passenger would wear goggles and an extra long leather overcoat called a dustcoat, but at their destination, on removal of the goggles they would be left with distinct clean panda eyes. June Driver (nee Murray, Assistant Orthodontist and one time President of the Liverpool and District Odontological Society) recalls: I remember he used to chuckle when telling me he was speeding along one day on his motorbike and was tipped off that there was a police speed trap ahead. He decided to enter the area of the trap, alight and eat his sandwiches at the side of the road, before proceeding again at speed, waving to the policeman at the other end of the speed trap. This just tickled his sense of mischievousness.1 ∗ Address for correspondence: 27 Loomsway, Irby, Wirral CH61 4UD. The author wishes to thank the following individuals for their assistance with the preparation of this paper: Dr J.K. Tweedie, Dr P.A. Chapman, Dr E.J.S. Clifford, Dr J. Driver (nee Murray), Dr B. Birkinhead, Dr H. Eirew, Dr J. Cooper, Mr A.G. McDonald, Mrs S. Cork. 1 Interview with June Driver on 14.9.00. 15 In the early 1900s Einstein published his first theories on physics and the universe and Watkin was fascinated by his work.2 Watkin owned a telescope and on 8 May 1910 he went to Mow Cop, just north of Stoke on Trent, to view Halley’s Comet as the Earth passed through part of its long tail. His interest in astronomy continued throughout his life. Watkin flew in an aeroplane before 1914, which was probably a Farman plane in a travelling show.3 In the early 1900s flyers used to go round the country and give people rides in their planes: like a novelty circus ride. Fees would be charged to go into a field where the pilots would live in tents and the public could watch as they took the planes up to circle the field. The Farman French training aircraft was a two-seated bi-plane and a passenger could sit alongside the pilot and may have been allowed to use controls under close supervision. Watkin’s interest in science led him to take up a job in the Equipment Department of the National Telephone Company and he worked on the first fully automatic telephone exchange in Potteries that opened in 1904. Through his studies at the Wedgwood Memorial Institute he gained Electrical Engineer qualifications, passing City and Guilds London Institute Certificates in Telephony, Telegraphy and Electrical Lighting and Power. He also befriended a local dentist and he used to go to help him in his laboratory. This gave him the confidence to follow an old wish to study dentistry. Though thirty years of age he left the telephone industry and embarked on a two year apprenticeship with dentist Mr J. Shields in the potteries In 1904, always interested in cutting edge technology, Watkin built his own X-ray machine powered by a Wimshurst machine.4 Rontgen discovered x-rays in 1895, and such tubes could be bought by anyone and the risks involved with handling X-rays were unknown.5 Using this apparatus he took the earliest known radiograph in Stoke-on-Trent for Mr. King Alcock, F.R.C.S., a local surgeon, who had a female patient who worked in a textile factory and the end of a machine needle had snapped off in her finger. In 1914 Watkin came to Liverpool where, exempt from fighting in the War because of the shortage of qualified dentists, he began to apply his engineering knowledge to dentistry. He studied at the Liverpool School of Dental Surgery when Mr W H Gilmour MDS LDS RCS (Eng.) was the warden.6 Watkin qualified in 1918 with an LDS Liv. aged 36 and became a member of the British Dental Association and Liverpool Odontological Society and in 1920 joined the Liverpool Microscopical Society. Some of the dental School registers are stored in the cellars of the Dental Museum and Watkin’s name appears many times recording his attendance, 2 Albert Einstein, 1879-1955. American theoretical physicist famous for his 1905 formulation of the relativity theory. 3 Maurice Farman, 1877-1964. French aircraft designer and manufacturer. Pioneer developer of early aviation. 4 James Wimshurst, 1832-1903. English inventor, engineer, and shipwright. 1883 first described Electrostatic generating Wimshurst machine. 5 Wilhelm Rontgen, 1845 –1923. German physicist. 1901 Recipient of first Nobel Prize for Physics for his discovery of X-rays. 6 Mr W H Gilmour MDS LDS RCS (Eng.) was warden of the Liverpool Dental School from 1898 to 1920. In 1920 was appointed to the Chair in Dental Surgery in the University of Liverpool. Professor Gilmour gave up a lucrative practice to become the first, and for many years the only salaried, full-time Professor of Dental Surgery in the British Isles. 16 both at lectures, and during a twelve-month period as a post-graduate House Surgeon at the Dental Hospital.7 Watkin’s First Dental Practice 1919-1930 As the First World War drew to a close, there was growing concern at the proliferation of unregistered dentists and the shortage of qualified ones. It was into this background that Watkin opened a Dental Practice at 95 Durning Road, Wavertree, Liverpool, with a Mr Cookson. He worked as a general dental practitioner and did some oral surgery, but his special interest was Orthodontics. In 1921 he became a member of the British Society for the Study of Orthodontics (BSSO) and a member of European Orthodontic Society (EOS) in 1926. The practice quickly became successful. Watkin began to build up a reputation of clinical excellence with a delightful manner towards children: he never spoke down to them, explaining what he was doing at each stage. I met one lady who, as a child, had a frightening experience with her own dentist and so refused treatment. She was referred to Watkin, because of his reputation with children and he quickly put her at her ease. He was interested in the effect of the soft tissue on the position of the teeth and would perform any surgery he believed necessary. I recently met an elderly woman who, as a small child, had her tongue freed by Watkin as she was suffering from ankyloglossitis.8 His notes also describe how it was sometimes necessary to shorten a tongue to prevent relapse following the removal of an orthodontic appliance The treatment which is most likely to be successful is to reduce the outward pressure of the tongue. This can easily be done by taking a wedge shaped piece out of the tongue. The final length and width should be estimated beforehand and this can be influenced by the length of the two incisions and the angle between them.9 Throughout his life the boundary between his work and home life was blurred as he applied himself with equal enthusiasm to his hobbies as to his professional tasks. He applied his ingenuity and engineering skill to perfect an electric mains-operated cigarette lighter as early as 1923 and adapted a Marsden gas/air anaesthetic machine to make a very efficient apparatus. Watkin continued to use his X-ray machine and in 1925 his nephew Arthur McDonald had an Xray done for Orthodontic treatment. Arthur remembered a sound like the buzzing of an angry swarm of bees emanating from the eight feet diameter by eighteen feet long induction coil mounted up on wall in Durning Road that gave out a huge typically many thousands of volts.10 At that time it was common practice to rest ones hand on the photographic plate feeling for warmth to tell if it had enough exposure. However, Watkin timed the exposure by stepping outside and smoking a Gold Flake cigarette. This is possibly one of the few occasions when smoking cigarettes could be considered beneficial to health, as cancer of the hand became a common disease of dentists and other early users of X-ray photography. 7 The Liverpool School of Dentistry Surgery was then housed in a building on the Pembroke Place area of the University Campus. Now it is housed in the School of Dentistry, Edwards Building, where part of the collection is on permanent display. 8 Bent tongue – to one side, or tethered tongue - at the bottom. 9 Watkin personal papers, held by Dr EJS Clifford. 10 Interview with A. McDonald on 4.09.00. 17 Watkin’s Grandfather, Henry Ball, sold Claremont House and with Watkin’s mother, Isabella, set up in home in 95 Durning Road. On 16 January 1923 Watkin married a former patient, Hilda Hayter (who was to become my grandmother). Hilda was born August 1900 in Cheyney Walk Chelsea and was much younger than he was. The daughter of an organ builder, and although not highly educated, she was an intelligent woman who later acted as practice manager and dealt with the clerical and financial side. The couple experienced the stillbirth of a boy at six months, then Joyce Kathleen was born in 1924 and Phyllis Anne in 1927, after which Hilda refused to have any more children. The First Successful Jaw Resection Watkin performed the first successful jaw resection operation in the UK in 1928 with Mr G.C.E. Simpson FRCS. Together they published a paper ‘The Surgical Correction of an Exaggerated Case of Inferior Protrusion’, which noted that In man, marked protrusion of the mandible (Bull Dog Jaw) is a rare condition which in its higher grades is a serious disadvantage to its unfortunate possessor, not only from the disfigurement, but because it leads to defective enunciation and difficulty in mastication.11 Figure 1: Illustration showing: in the upper two images, the original presentation of the jaw and teeth alignment and in the lower two images, the result after corrective surgery. (Source: H.G. Watkin and G.C.E. Simpson, ‘The Surgical Correction of an Exaggerated Case of Inferior Protrusion’, Brit. Ortho., Oral Surg. & Rad., Int. Jnl XVI, (1930), 1163-1167.) 11 H.G. Watkin and G.C.E. Simpson, ‘The Surgical Correction of an Exaggerated Case of Inferior Protrusion’, Brit. Ortho. Oral Surg. & Rad. Int. Jnl, XVI, (1930), 1163-1167. 18 The patient, at the age of 28 had qualified for a ship’s captain’s ticket and was so permitted to take the first position on board ship. For this high profile job he would be expected to take up a position at the Captain’s table and dine with the passengers. However his extremely prominent lower jaw with his lower incisors being 17mm in front of his uppers, resulted in him being ashamed to eat in public. Only two of his teeth met to chew his food and as his lips did not seal food would spray out of his mouth. This also caused problems with enunciation. The operation was therefore considered necessary for his quality of life. Watkin did not lack in confidence and his partner was an experienced surgeon, but the pair did plenty of research and mental preparation before beginning this daring operating. The process was performed as follows: 1. Preparation was made by fixing metal bands with buccal hooks to the back molars that should occlude. 2. A small incision, about half an inch long, was made on the outside of the jaw, the correct position being ascertained by palpitation and x-ray examination. A blunt instrument steered a deep path right around the jawbone and a flexible Gigli saw was used to cut from within outwards almost through the bone. Great care had to be taken to avoid damaging the facial nerve and the parotid gland, as there was a real danger of severing them. The final break was made using a very carefully angled fine chisel. Mallet and chisel work was Watkin’s forte. 3. The jawbone was drawn back and the looped teeth were wired together. 4. After 6 weeks, and being fed through a glass straw, the jaws were left permanently set in a normal position. The patient made a full recovery, with no complications and after some minor adjustments of the posterior teeth to compensate for the lack of normal wear, the patient had 16 teeth in good occlusion and was able to eat and enunciate well. He continued to work as a ship’s captain for many years. Orthodontic practice 1930-1965 In 1930 Watkin decided to concentrate on Orthodontics and set up a specialist Orthodontic practice at 84 Rodney Street, Liverpool. Rodney Street was an affluent residential street just outside the city centre and coincidentally, number 62 was the birthplace of Watkin’s namesake, William Ewart Gladstone, the Prime Minister. At the time there were only two other such Orthodontic Specialist Practices in UK, one in London and the other one in Dublin. Ever interested in educating others about Orthodontics, in 1930, he presented a paper to the Liverpool and District Odontological Society where he discussed the various forms of dental malocclusion, borrowing freely from the classification devised by the American Orthodontic pioneer, Edward Angle.12 With a growing reputation as an outstanding clinician, in 1933, the British Society honoured him for the Study of Orthodontics by being elected President. 12 Angle, E.H., Dent. Cosmos., 58 (1916), 988. Edward Hartley Angle (1855-1910) was an American dentist, widely regarded as the father of Orthodontics. 19 Figure 2: Watkin Gladstone Watkin, wearing the insignia of the President of the British Society for the Study of Orthodontics, 1933. (Source: Watkin personal papers, held by Dr EJS Clifford). Watkin’s Presidential Address was one of his very few published works and in it he discussed the problems associated with the welding of stainless steel Orthodontic wire and the importance of soft tissue, i.e. tongue and cheeks, in achieving stability at the end of Orthodontic treatment.13 The latter observations were very advanced at the time. In 1934 he was elected as President of the Liverpool Odontological Society, and in 1937, of the West Lancashire, West Cheshire and North Wales Branch of the British Dental Association. In his BSSO presidential address he discussed the problems associated with welding steel wire and the importance of considering the influence of soft tissue when undertaking Orthodontic correction. Both of these points put him ahead of the field and were later developed to contribute to his future success. For instance, his paper of 1939 discussed the different devices available for maintaining the position of corrected teeth and discusses the radical theory that the bone supporting teeth acts in a similar way to a very viscous liquid, so if there is no stable force keeping the teeth in a corrected position, they will eventually float back to the pre-treated position.14 These ranged from a small metal disc, with a raised section in the middle that could be bitten when relaxing to hold the corrected teeth in place, to a metal pole that protruded out of the mouth which could be weighted for strengthening the lips. He describes the use of this as being not unpleasant, rather like sucking on a cigarette. 13 H.G. Watkin, ‘Treated Cases (President’s Address)’, Brit.Soc.Orthodontics (1933) Vol LIII, No.11. H.G. Watkin, ‘Stabilisation of Treated Cases’, Dental Record June 1939. Original typed script 15.7.38. Watkin personal papers, held by Dr EJS Clifford. 14 20 Watkin Appliances In the early years of Orthodontics, removable appliances (plates), as opposed to the more expensive and complex fixed appliances, were commonly used. Watkin, with his intuitive and inventive mind and engineering skills was attracted to the fixed type. Although these were more difficult to construct they were more efficient and the design of which gave him more scope for his ingenuity. One such appliance that fascinated him and had potential for development was the Pin and Tube Appliance. This was time consuming and, therefore, expensive to construct. It lacked flexibility and needed adjusting every two to three weeks. Trauma to the teeth could only be avoided by very careful handling. These shortcomings concerned Watkin so he devised an adaptation, not only addressing these problems, but also endowing his appliance with extra beneficial features. He replaced the rather rigid ‘pin’ with a loop formed in the arch wire that slotted into a box-tube welded to a metal band cemented to a tooth. This became known as a ‘loop and tube’ attachment. Adjustment of this loop in relation to the box-tube permitted three-dimensional control of the tooth. This extended the periods between adjustments to six weeks and provided means for quick arch-wire removal, cleaning, adjustment and reinsertion. The implications for the patients were great as it meant that they needed fewer appointments and those they had were shorter. High tensile stainless steel became available for arch wire construction in 1934 giving the appliances increased efficiency and flexibility, enabling the need for clinical adjustment to be extended to eight week periods. The Free-Sliding Arch was essentially a loop and tube appliance at the front but the correcting wires extended backwards to a banded molar on each side of the mouth. This Appliance was ideal for retracting and rotating incisor teeth as desired. If prominent incisors were to be corrected the two backward wires would be bent up or downwards a specific distance from the molar bands. The end of each wire would then be inserted into horizontal tubes welded onto the molar bands creating lever-torque tension on the wire that would adjust the incisors without the molars being moved in reaction. Any incisor rotation that was required could be done simultaneously by bending the arch wire laterally by the amount and in the direction that would cause precise correcting forces. These were important clinical attributes at the time but the technique required accurate and sensitive handling, and in unskilled hands could be unsuccessful and even harmful. Figure 3: The Watkin free-sliding arch and loop and tube adaptation. (Source: E.J.S. Clifford, ‘The Watkin Free-Sliding Arch. An introduction’, The Dent. Pract. Vol 16, No 1, (1965), 35.) 21 Watkin’s technical skill on the bench and lathe combined with an active and inventive mind enabled him to construct any pliers, and indeed, apparatus that might aid construction and chairside adjustment of his appliances. The loop and tube appliance relied on controlled bends and coils in the correcting wire so it was necessary to have a specific tool for the purpose. Initially he bought high quality surgical pliers and used his lathe to grind the tips to the desired shape. However, as the use of his adaptation increased he worked with local toolmakers, Elliots, of Buckland Street Aigburth, in Liverpool who produced the Watkin Pliers commercially. The Dental Manufacturing Company in London also sold Watkin pliers. As Watkin’s practice grew he took on a partner Mike Booth, then John Clifford who initially assisted at Watkin House, then in 1959 became Watkin’s partner and finally, in 1965, his successor. John became a great advocate of Watkin’s work and published the paper ‘The Watkin Free-Sliding Arch an introduction in The Dental Practitioner’ 1965 and this substantially raised the profile of this device.15 The Orthodontist, Hans Eirew, who studied under Watkin at the Turner Dental School in Manchester, gave a lecture in East Germany around 1980 and presented the Watkin Fee-sliding Arch as a concept. On his return a year later he was shown some before and after pictures by one man who had made the appliance out of old cigarette tins. The results were excellent. The simplicity of the device also made it much easier for the patient to keep it clean and made simple repairs possible by a non-specialist. The workshop in the cellar underneath the family home was the place that Watkin spent most of his spare time, working on his latest project and chain-smoking up to 80 cigarettes a day. He bought his first lathe, a Drummond round bed lathe, in the early 1920s, which was kept in basement of Durning Road. He bought parts of an upgraded Myford lathe and built the gearbox himself, buying the individual gears ready made. He copied the design from the catalogue, as was it cheaper and more satisfying to make it himself. One of his good friends was Joe Davies who was a rough, flat capped, odd job man and provided brawn to Watkin’s brains. Joe’s wife came to work in kitchen. Arthur, Dotty’s son, had come to Liverpool to study Dentistry and he lodged with the family. Watkin, Arthur and Joe spent many happy hours working together down in the cellar. Around 1930, with another good friend, Sam Lowey, a Liverpool City Council Electrical Engineer, he made a radio receiver about as big as three milk bottles. It was housed in an oblong wooden box with a receiver and had a separate box for the battery. Colleagues and students would travel far to stay for a few days at his family home, for a small charge, and they would be trained up in the use of the Watkin Welder and used his equipment to make pliers. Often they would work together far into the night on his Myford lathe. Health and safety legislation was far in the future and Watkin was more concerned about convenience. To go to the cellar they would go down some steep steps, turn right and Watkin had devised it so that the light turned on automatically on opening the door, much easier if he was carrying something. The workshop had things hanging from ceiling so taller people would bang their head. There was no heating, so he set a round unprotected Bunsen burner was on the concrete floor that was coated in odd stones and bits of machine debris. He used to stand over this to keep warm and his wife forever had to repair singed trouser turn-ups. 15 E.J.S. Clifford, ‘The Watkin Free-Sliding Arch. An introduction’, The Dent. Pract. Vol 16, No 1, (1965), 35. 22 Watkin’s Role in Orthodontic Education Even very early in his dental career Watkin showed an active interest in Orthodontic education as is illustrated in his copy of the BSSO’s Education Committee’s Report of December 1922 where he has highlighted the section which starts: ‘The student qualifies, knowing less of Orthodontics than of any other branch of dentistry’.16 The highlighted section then goes on to discuss the advantages and disadvantages of having a specialist lecturer for this subject. So, in 1935 he became a Lecturer in Orthodontics at the Turner Dental School in Manchester and in 1937 in the Liverpool Dental Hospital. This also gave him the advantage that the he could get reduced tuition fees for both his daughters, as Phyllis studied Dentistry at Manchester and Joyce, Medicine at Liverpool. His enthusiasm for his subject was contagious and he loved demonstrating principles and could make the seemingly impossible appears easy. He would begin his lectures giving out reproductions of hand drawn diagrams on pieces of card produced on the photographic equipment he had built. He would introduce a general theme but would very quickly become engrossed in the fine mechanical details of a specific point. He was not above making a fool of himself in order to prove a scientific principle. Hans Eirew, an ex-pupil, relates one such incident: It was the vogue at the time to say that gravity played a major role in ensuring stability of the full lower denture and they were made very heavy. Watkin by this time was a denture wearer and to disprove this theory, stood on his head and ate a cake! I bet they never forget that lesson!17 He continued this work until the late 1940s and a university record of 1 October 1947 states: This board wishes to place on record its appreciation of the many years of skilful and valuable service that have been given by Mr HG Watkin, to express its gratitude for his help in continuing after the retirement age, pending the reorganisation of the Orthodontic Department, and to wish him prolonged health in the future.18 The Watkin Welder In the 1930s modern materials such as acrylic and stainless steel allowed for cheaper and more effective appliances. A change from the use of precious metals to stainless steel was eased by the invention of the spot welder by Watkin Gladstone Watkin. Many dental appliances required fine spot welding of the components and Watkin discussed this in a paper of 1932.19 The existing unreliable condenser type of spot welder built up a huge surge of power then often burnt through the appliance that the practitioner might have spent hours constructing. Having identified this as a problem he constructed the first Watkin Spot Welder using materials he already had in his workshop: a carbon arc lamp, two brass rods, a transformer and a Bowden brake-cable and made a most effective device. His invention had timed contact, which 16 Watkin personal papers, held by Dr EJS Clifford. Interview with Hans Eirew on 23.8.00. 18 Historical records held by the Liverpool Dental Hospital Museum. 19 H.G. Watkin, Joining Stainless Steel Wires. Brit. Soc. Ortho. Trans., (1932), 43-44. 17 23 allowed a much greater success rate when soldering fine wires, especially, steel. It also had a daisy wheel type head so that the size of the contacts could be changed for different gauges of wire. He then worked with Elliot’s of Liverpool who produced the welder commercially and promoted it in the instruction manual: ‘The Watkin welder has been designed by an eminent orthodontist essentially for the speedy and efficient welding of stainless steel wire and tape. Weighing only 35lbs, it is completely portable…The Watkin welder has proved invaluable to other professions, and is used extensively in the engineering, electrical and allied trades.’ The valve maker Mullard used Watkin Welders during and after the Second World War for valves and it was used by leading Orthodontists, clinicians and hospitals throughout the world. The Watkin Welder sold widely and it was in use for twenty-five years until an electronic spot welder superseded it. Watkin did become wealthy through its sales but as he did not believe in patents he did not make the great fortune he perhaps deserved. Modern spot welders still have more than a passing resemblance to his original design, especially in the rotating star head section. Elliots Liverpool Ltd also produced the Watkin Dental Vibrator, but this never sold in great numbers. Figure 4: Illustration from the cover of the booklet Specifications and Instructions for the operation of the Watkin Orthodontic Spot Welder produced by Elliots of Liverpool Ltd. (Source: Watkin personal papers, held by Dr EJS Clifford.) With the advent of the Second World War his daughters were evacuated to North Wales for six months in 1939 because of the threat of bombing. But no bombs fell in Liverpool until they returned. Watkin’s mother, Isabella, died on 31 December in 1939 while the children were evacuated and Hilda’s mother, Annie Hayter, who was by then a widow, moved in to live with the family. Watkin had built an air raid shelter from half of a ship’s boiler at the bottom of the garden and had it covered to look like rockery. Anderson shelters were available from local authority at reduced cost, but true to form, Watkin wanted to build his own. The shelter housed 24 four bunks and a store of tinned food and the family slept in it nearly every night. During the worst night of the war in 1941 all windows were blown out of the house, the roof was blown off and the ground subsided under a bay window. One of his contributions to the dig-for-victory campaign was to develop an automatic watering, temperature and humidity mechanism for use in his conservatory at his home in Aigburth, where he grew tomato plants so large that the prodigious crops broke the plant supports. After the war his daughter Joyce became a Doctor of Medicine, qualifying from Liverpool University and Phyllis followed in her father’s footsteps and qualified as a Dental Surgeon and Orthodontist at Manchester. From the late 1940s Phyllis worked alongside her father in the Rodney Street practice until her marriage. The Royal College of Surgeons of England awarded Watkin an F.D.S. without examination in 1947 and the Diploma in Orthodontics in 1954. His contribution to the advancement of dental science was also recognised in Scotland when the Royal Faculty of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow bestowed on him the Diploma of Dental Orthopaedics, for which examination he was, for a time, on the board His inventive hobbies After the war Watkin continued to make new devices using his now extensive tool collection. When he was asked to list his hobbies he wrote: ‘Photography, particularly in connection with lectures. Screw-cutting, lathe work and anything mechanical’.20 One of his most legendary devices was the automatic garage door, which he invented in the 1940s, almost half a century before they became commonplace in the UK. It worked as follows: 1. The drive and garage gates were left closed with the device activated, entailing much physical winding and noise. 2. He flicked a switch on the dashboard of his Austin 16 car that sent a current to the front bumper. 3. The car was driven slowly up to the gates so that the bumpers made electrical contact with electrodes on the gates to activate a set of motors. 4. Pulleys and chains released bolts and springs and counter-weights dropped causing the gates and garage doors to swing open and the light turn on. The tale has been embroidered to say a record then came on playing ‘Home Sweet Home’. 5. The car could then be driven straight in. Local people knew what time he would come home and would sometimes wait to watch, some even applauded, others thought it was an accident from the noise. One frequently related story is that one-day the garage door mechanism failed and Watkin drove straight through the doors but I suspect that it only refers to his forgetting to use the dashboard switch. At the Liverpool and District Odontological Society people would go and talk about all sorts of scientific and technical things, not just related to teeth. About 1949/50 Watkin took along a donkey engine to the meeting. He had made it himself out of brass and it was six inches high and six inches long and probably worked using methylated spirits. Recycling was not popular then but he preferred to reuse materials than buy new, even if that would be more convenient. For example, if he needed a screw or bolt he would just make it on his Myford lathe, 20 Watkin personal papers, held by the Liverpool Dental Hospital Museum. 25 he even made spare parts for the lathe, using the lathe itself. When the engine failed on his Morris car, with a problem relating to its cylinder head, he went down his local dealer. Being told that he would have to buy a whole set, not a single component part – the one he needed, he went home and made it himself, plus two spares which he took to the garage. As Watkin was short in stature it would have been especially inconvenient for him to climb up and wind the high-mounted grandfather clock. He therefore contrived an efficient selfwinding mechanism, although it was not an original idea. Hilda was seldom impressed with his devices and this was epitomised in his adaptation of the cooker. She had commented that it was difficult to bend right down and lift a heavy joint from the bottom oven of their cooker. The following day, when she was out, he cut the cooker in half and mounted the oven on a metal surgical trolley and plumbed it in so it worked. On returning home she took one look at the result and banned him from ever working in the kitchen again. His musical tastes were conventional and he liked waltzes of Strauss (having pleasant memories of a conference in Vienna) but not sopranos that he called ‘chelping gels’. He would take advantage of his trips to other cities by attending musicals and like many men at the time enjoyed anything by Petula Clark. He designed and constructed an electronic flash unit for clinical photography. It was a big heavy and dangerous piece of apparatus that used condensers. He also made all his own lanternslides and enlargers. His simple ingenuity was illustrated in the use of a mirror at 45 degrees to show simultaneous profile and portrait. He then recycled the lead backing off the used lanternslides to form impression plates. He installed a simple lift, rather like a dumb waiter, into 84 Rodney Street. It was used to transport the impressions down to the basement to be cast into models, boxed up and stored between appointments. The lift still works. Watkin would regularly visit the local scrap yard to see what he could find useful. One such item was the wing flap actuator motor from a US Air force Liberator Bomber plane that he took home and made into a conveniently sized hand held grinder. Similar grinders were available commercially, but Watkin enjoyed the creation process. He used the grinder for trimming the metal edges of his dental appliances. Sue Cork (nee Robinson) was an Assistant to both Watkin and John Clifford between 1963 and 1966. ‘I can still picture his beaming smile as one of us helped him into his stiffly starched white jacket each morning with all the fiddly buttons down the side.’21 Having more people in the practice gave him more time to lecture and travel to the EOS and BSSO meetings he so enjoyed. He never refused a request to address colleagues or to demonstrate to overseas congresses in America and Europe. Although not extravagant with his wealth, he did prefer to travel by plane before air transport became a popular and generally affordable choice. As he approached his eighties he no longer lectured, but he stopped even mentioning retirement from work and just reduced to three days a week. His brain never faltered although he did become slower with his hands. He continued to attend BSSO monthly meeting in London and a former pupil, Hans Eirew, would catch the late train back so as to spend time in Watkin’s company. Watkin always had a waistcoat with pockets full of bits of paper with diagrams, some spare pliers and wire and would produce a stub pencil and sketch amendments to the most recent lecturer’s ideas. At the conference there would always be a cluster of people round him as he demonstrated some new idea. He was realistic about his abilities, not boastful, but not overly modest. For example, when exhibiting some of his work to a group of specialists in Glasgow and one said to him, ‘Well Mr Watkin, what products of your ingenuity have you brought to show us 21 Interview with Sue Cork on 21.3.07. 26 today?’ He replied, indicating a specific model, ‘This one is the most ingenious.’22 His work was recognised and honoured by the highest authorities in the UK: 1947 RCS, honorary FDS 1954 Diploma in Orthodontics from RCSRCS. Eng 1954 Diploma of Dental Orthopaedic Royal Faculty of Physicians and Surgeons Glasgow. (He also worked for a period on the examination board of the FRCS, Glasgow). 1961 Life Membership of the BDA 1965 Elected President of the Liverpool and District Odontological Society. On 11 November 1965, he died at the age of 83 years, the day after seeing a full list of patients and mentioning that he was going to ‘do something with the fridge’. Sue Cork, Practice Assistant recalls: ‘We were all so sad when he passed away, it was like losing a member of the family and all the staff attended his funeral, and went back to the family home in Aigburth Road.’23 He was buried in Burslem Cemetery but, thanks to John Clifford, his memory lives on in both Liverpool and Manchester. 84 Rodney Street was renamed Watkin House about ten years after his death and a padded upholstered seat in lecture theatre was named after him when Manchester Dental Hospital refurbished the post-graduate room around 1980. As a teacher his enthusiasm, technical competence and approachability inspired many students to follow his steps and many are now leaders in the field of Orthodontics.24 22 Interview with JK Tweedie (nee Watkin) on 18.02.07. Interview with Sue Cork on 21/2/07. 24 H.G. Watkin Obituary, Brit. Dent. J., 12 (1965). 23