By 1920, Sadie left private practice and became the first hygienist employed by the California Department of Health, in the state’s first Division of Dental Hygiene. Emma joined her there. Now the work moved beyond offices and into communities. Sadie and Emma traveled. They visited health departments. They entered schools. They screened children. They taught teachers. They carried the message of prevention from one place to another,
likely with more conviction than resources and more determination than comfort.

It is worth pausing here.

Because this is where dental hygiene in California becomes something larger than employment. It becomes a public promise.
A promise that oral health mattered.
A promise that prevention mattered.
A promise that children, including poor children, deserved care before pain became
inevitable.

Sadie and Emma were no longer simply practicing a new profession. They were proving why it needed to exist...And then came the next act of courage. In 1920, Sadie Greenhood, Emma Platt, Harriet Prosser, and Leticia Wright formed the California State Dental Hygienists’ Association. Leticia Wright became the first president.

Four women.
One young profession.
No guarantee that anyone would listen.

But they understood something essential: a profession without an organization is a voice without a microphone. So, they built one.

​CDHA, though not yet known by that later name, took its first breath.

GO TO NEXT: Chapter 4 - The Fearless Four