Hello, As so often happens, I start to research one thing or one person, and 24 hours later, I have accidentally learned about six other things. Yesterday, tried looking on my CD-version of an encyclopedia for the AZORES, and was not successful. Out of curiousity, I did a search for .. Billerica, MA, .. and came across an article on .. Miss Elizabeth Palmer PEABODY, a famous educator in MA in the 1800's. Because she was born in Billerica, I looked in the "History of Billerica" and found out she was the daughter of .. Nathaniel PEABODY, M.D. Today I was looking through the archives of the PEABODY Message Boards and discovered that he is said to have been a .. Dentist. Because he had already graduated from Dartmouth College in 1800, had married in 1802, and had his first child in BIllerica in 1804, I thought that was a little early for .. being a Dentist. I just did a Google search for "Dentistry, History," and learned that there were many Dentists in England in the .. 1700's. But the first Dental School in the U.S. didn't come about until after 1800. (?) And, the Dentists who did arrive in "the Colonies" in the 1700's were educated in England. I also learned that the first woman Dentist in the U.S. was in the 1800's and was Mrs. Emeline JONES of CT. Here is a pretty good timeline for the history of Dentistry: http://cudental.creighton.edu/HTM/history2001.PDF Betty (near Lowell, MA) P.S. Dr. Nathaniel PEABODY and Mrs. Elizabeth PEABODY had two more daughters. The second one married ..Horace MANN .. and the third one married .. Nathaniel HAWTHORNE. From the Archives of the Message Boards, I have learned that there was a book written about the "Three PEABODY Sisters from Salem." And, there is a web site which discusses them.