Sniped
Cubby, I am no expert on teeth but when my daughter went to her 1st dental appointment at 4yrs they took x-rays and she is missing 4 of her adult teeth on the bottom. They are not underneath her baby teeth. At this point we are just waiting to see if they appear. The dentist said it could be because her mouth is too small right now or it could be because the teeth just aren’t there. I am afraid it is the second because my husband had the same issue with one of his bottom teeth and had to wear braces to move his teeth around to compensate. My MIL still has 2 of her baby teeth for the same reason – no adult teeth underneath. Could this be the reason the socket was open. The baby tooth was lost after death and there was not an adult tooth behind it, making it look like an adult tooth was lost?
That very well could be the reason the #9 socket is open. My nephew, I think, has the same thing with some adult teeth which never formed.
NamUs indicates the ME has xrays, so they would know whether or not adult teeth had formed for this decedent.
They just, imo, were incredibly vague about what information they had on the dentals, which, for identification purposes in a public database is not very helpful for those of us researchers. NamUs wasn't designed strictly for LE and ME. It was also designed as a resource for the public, so why not give the public the information they need to help identify these people? All the O's left the general public like ourselves wondering if these were baby teeth which never erupted.
I am going to call the coroner before the end of the week. Maybe later today or tomorrow as we have a pretty busy day today. I would like to ask the questions about the baby teeth. I would also like to offer feedback as to how much more usefull more descriptive information on the baby teeth would have been and may be to the general public to help id this decedent. Not in a bad way, just to offer what I believe may be helpful, because we do all this research for zero tax dollars. If the interest is there to help, why not make the information as user friendly as possible?
Sometimes I honestly think 'brilliant people', and by that I mean experts are so in tune with their field of expertise they forget to step out of the box and think like those outside their field. (kind of like the old saying, book smart but common sense stupid, lol.)
When I get the info to the questions, I'll update here and at the general discussion thread.