My mom was born in 1938. By the time she got married in 1959 she had false teeth. I asked her about it when I was young, and she told me that she had “gum disease” as a teenager and the dentist pulled all her teeth and gave her dentures. Growing up in the 70’s and 80’s I remember that dentures were a common part of life - there were always commercials for denture cream and fizzy denture cleaning tablets on TV, and there was a comedic trope about grandpa’s dentures that would show up in sitcoms. I don’t know anyone of my own generation who has dentures, and I don’t really hear anything about dentures in pop culture anymore. Were dentists more prone to give patients false teeth in the first half of the 20th century? Why did that change?
"Preventative Dentistry," is common today, but the practice of everyday people going to a dentist to receive treatment/cleaning that would prevent dental and periodontal problems down the line isn't that old. It came to prominence in the 1970s, although it was being practiced at a smaller scale by the late 19th century.
Similarly, although people have used various means to clean their teeth for centuries, it wasn't until 1857 that mass-produced toothbrushes became available in the United States, and they didn't become nearly ubiquitous until 1938, when the first nylon-bristled toothbrush was released.
So earlier generations, without much professional assistance or ubiquitous ways to clean their teeth at home, often had problems with their teeth and gums.
How common were these dental problems?
To give you an idea of the scale of the problem, prior to World War II, US recruitment requirements stated that recruits had to have at least six opposing teeth. During WWII recruitment, around 400,000 young men were disqualified from serving because they didn't meet even this requirement. The standard had to be lowered to meet wartime recruitment goals. So dental problems among the young were extremely common.
Many people growing up as recently as the 1950s remember only going to dentists when there was a problem that needed to be addressed, which usually included a filling, root canal, or having a tooth pulled. But by the 1970s, a new focus on preventing problems had taken hold among dentists and periodontists.
So what happened to dentures?
Recent advances in dental/periodontal care have led to fewer people losing their teeth, and generally keeping them longer, even if they do eventually lose them. Water fluoridation began in 1938 and soon spread around the country, decreasing the rate of cavities between 20 and 50%. Dental implants also became common in the late 20th century as an alternative to removable dentures. Periodontists have developed a number of surgeries and cleaning protocols to address gum health.
So we don't hear about odor-reducing cleaning solutions for dentures on TV because there are fewer people who have dentures today. But they haven't disappeared, and plenty of people do have some form of teeth replacement even today.