We’re #3! A history of collections at the School of Dentistry

The way students of dentistry learn has changed a lot since the dental school was founded in 1875.

The Sindecuse Museum is actually the third collection to be housed in the School of Dentistry at the University of Michigan. Preceding the Sindecuse was the Ford-Mitchell Museum, an anatomical collection of human and animal crania. These were used as teaching tools for dental students, beginning in the 1880s. This was transferred to the Ruthven Museum in 1928, soon after it opened, and dental students continued to study that collection in its new location. The school also held the Dentistry Library, for many years and in different locations. The library began informally after the school’s 1875 foundation and grew over time, eventually hiring an employee in 1910 and receiving funding from the Carnegie Foundation in 1929 (Additional history of the dental library is described n the Dentistry Library finding aid at the Bentley Historical Library).

The duration of the school’s three dental collections are shown here in a timeline illustration by Kenneth Rieger

Many years later in the 1990s, the Sindecuse Museum of Dentistry was founded with a series of financial gifts from Dr. Gordon Sindecuse. Sindecuse was a 1921 alum who stipulated his donation must go to create a museum of dentistry. At the time, his lawyer cautioned the school that too much “red tape” would cause Dr. Sindecuse to donate his money elsewhere. A museum committee was formed to determine the new institution’s goals, described in a 1991 press release as “collecting, preserving and exhibiting memorabilia representing stages in the evolution of the profession.” The museum officially opened to the public on September 18, 1992. The Winter 1992 issue of DentAlum said the generous gift of $1 million made it possible to renovate the W. K. Kellogg lobbies, purchase collections, and establish an endowment to ensure perpetual support.”

The Sindecuse Museum’s third and current curator and director, Shannon O’Dell, has been with the museum since 2003 and the University of Michigan since 1995. She differentiates the museum from earlier collections at the School of Dentistry:

“Today’s Sindecuse Museum of Dentistry has a history separate from the earlier specimen-focused teaching collection. Rather than training dental students, its purpose is modeled on other history museums that address a broad audience interested in learning about history through artifacts and exhibitions.” - Shannon O’Dell, in Object Lessons &The Formation of Knowledge.

In 2017, O’Dell contributed a history of our dental institutions, including the quote above, to the book Object Lessons and the Formation of Knowledge: The University of Michigan Museums, Libraries, and Collections 1817–2017. Edited by Kerstin Barndt and Carla M. Sinopoli, this history of the university’s many collections is available through Michigan Publishing and the University Press.