March 6, 2023 - National Dentist Day | National Oreo Cookie Day

Welcome to March 6th, 2023 on the National Day Calendar. Today we celebrate teeth specialists and a cookie imposter. There was a time that if you needed a haircut and had a toothache, you would go to the same place. A barbershop. Barbers weren’t proper dentists—they didn’t provide any preventive services or teeth cleaning. But they did perform tooth extractions if someone was in pain. They used something called a dental key, which was an early version of forceps. This practice started in the Middle Ages and didn’t end until the 1800s, when dentists and barbers became two separate things. And thank goodness for that. On National Dentist Day, we celebrate the people who keep us smiling and the fact that we can get our hair cut without worrying about Novocaine. If I asked you what kind of cookie has two crunchy chocolate biscuits with cream filling between them, you would say…? Well, if you would have asked someone that question in the early 1900s, they would have given you a different answer. Hydrox. When Oreos made their debut in 1912, Hydrox had already been on the market for 4 years. In fact, Hydrox launched ad campaigns to make sure consumers knew that the new cookies were imposters. For years, Oreos didn’t make any money for the Nabisco company and they might have disappeared without a strong ad strategy and a redesign. In the 1950s, Oreos overtook their rival in popularity and Hydrox began to look like the imposter. On National Oreo Cookie Day, celebrate this classic with a glass of milk and maybe a twist. I’m Anna Devere and I’m Marlo Anderson. Thanks for joining us as we Celebrate Every Day. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices