False Teeth

These false teeth were owned by Captain Cyrus Roberts while serving at Fort Bowie. At that time, Fort Bowie was a remote frontier fort that afforded little in modern comforts and no dental facilities. In fact, the nearest dentist was located in Albuquerque, New Mexico, over 350 miles away. According to Roberts' son, a rat stole the false teeth from the captain's bedside and they were never recovered. National Park Service employees found the teeth during historic preservation work nearly 100 years later.