Mortician VI

At the funeral home, the door chimed and I went down to greet this old lady. Her late husband was in Viewing Room B. She wanted to see if Jack had his socks on.

I took her to B, lifted open the bottom of Jack's casket and showed Marti that his socks were in place.

She drew back, put both hands to her face and said,

"Thank Goodness ! I thought his feet might be COLD" !!!  

mortician V

Flies were flocking to the screens.

After two weeks, neighbors  living in the sticks called police complaining of odor.

The police responded and found an elderly female woman decomposing in a closed closet. It was August in Iowa, hot and humid. Soaponfication was occuring. Floors were slimy, slippery. Stench.

The coroner was called . He was an Irish MD, cigar, could have passed for a NY ward director.

He ordered the crime photographer to go in and take pictures.

The photographer balked ," I  I  Can't do it " He was a sophomore in journalism, seeking experience in crime photography. The coroner threw him in, slammed the door and ordered,"Take  ALL pictures".  The he called the Oathout  F H for body bag pickup to the morgue for autopsy.

I was in class so I missed this one, but our head embalmer took the call. When he neared the address, he told us later--

I KNEW IT WAS GOING TO BE A BAD ONE, THE POLICE WERE VOMITING IN THE STREETS !!!!!!

   

 

Mortician IV

The Oathout Funeral Home was located in Iowa City, Iowa. IC was also home of the Univ of Iowa and had a huge medical facility with hospital. I often had to pick up a body at the hospital morgue  and return to the funeral home for embalming and then placed in an aluminum container for shipping. The morgue was chilled, kinda dark, and deathly quiet. Its entry code was DOA.

Shipping  to an out of town mortuary was either by train (Rock Island RR) or the other mortuary would drive to Iowa City. There was a damn train that was to arrive at 02:30 AM. and was ALWAYS late about 2-3 hours. If I were on duty, that would be my bag.

One evening the door bell rang and I went down. A driver was there to pick up an embalmed body and drive it into Illinois 300 miles.

There were two bodies in storage. Neither was tagged. Like a patient in a hospital, corpses are always tagged. We looked behind the ears, in the crack of the butt. No tag.

There's more.

BOTH were white males, similarly aged and sized. And get this--both had their LEFT legs amputated at the knee.

I went up front and inspected the two death certificates. The first and 2nd years of dental school are studying all the -ologies; indeed, at that time, Harvard had their dental and medical schools take the same classes for two years. So I had some knowledge in this area.

Both Ralph A. and Ralph B. had died of heart disease, 2nd cause diabetes but Ralph B. had a tertiary cause of liver decease. We went back and saw that Ralph B. was slightly jaundiced by the yellow hue.

Good Luck and Good Night !!

 

Mortician III

While living at the funeral home in college, Jet and I had a lot of people stop by after classes for libations. They always wanted a tour of the building. We'd show them the casket room in the basement, the office, the rooms where services were held, view rooms, the embalming studio, the hearse, the works.

On one occasion I had Jet tell some newbies that I wasn't home yet but would they like a tour. Of course they did.

I had slipped down the back stairs and climbed under a sheet on the embalming table. I could hear them coming down the hall and entering the embalming room.

Is that a BODY ???!!!

I wiggled my little finger.

LOOK !!! I saw IT MOVE !!!

I waited two seconds and let out a groan.........

All the doors went flying open as all, including Jet, exploded out of the room.  

 

Mortician II

Jet and I were married in 1955, honeymooned in Reno and Las Vegas, then returned to Iowa City for continuous schooling toward our RN and DDS degrees.

We moved into the Oathout Funeral Home. Two student couples lived on the 2nd floor. We moved into one of these two apartments. 1 bdr, 1 shared bath, no shower in those days. We would be on duty, switching every night, coat and tie, escorting folks to the room to view the deceased in their casket, flowers around. If there was a pickup of a body at the Univ of Iowa morgue, one of us could handle it. Called a "shipout"

 If a person would die at home at night, both of the husbands would have to get up, coat and tie, drive to the address and wrap and cot the body and return to the funeral home. The embalmer would soon be there to treat the body and we guys could go back to bed.

To be continued on M III               

Mortician I

In a few I will prune my old  blogs down to less time sensitive. My 1st stories deal with the funeral business. I was groomed to be a mortician.

My Dad and his twin brother left the farm after the 8th grade and joined a mortuary school, moving from Iowa to Kansas City.

My Dad wore a coat and tie every day. I felt so proud when I walked with my Dad downtown. He would tip his hat to strangers, had a pace of military about him.

But he first learned to tie a tie on a corpse in Kansas City.

To the day that he died, he would lie a tie on the bed, knot it on the bed, then noose it around his neck impeccably.   

Dental Picks

The standard interdental cleaning device is the dental floss introduced by a dentist in Texas and marketed by Johnson and Johnson. It is packaged in a spool of nylon thread contained in a small package with a thread cutter. Available in waxed or unwaxed nylon or teflon, a string of about 10 inches is pulled and cut, wrapped around the first finger of each hand and with the thumbs is held tightly and pressed between the contacts of two teeth. Then it is rowed back and forth in the triangular space and removed by pulling out the thread to one side or snapped back through the contacts. 

Problems.

Very laborious. Not practical for use in public places. Most common waxed floss leaves instant plaque behind. All can break, sometimes difficult to retrieve. All can cut the gums, causing bleeding. Can't be used between most bridgework without an accessory. Pushed on patients by dental professionals without demonstration of alternatives. Difficult to use by most older patients due to loss of dexterity. 

An Alternative.

The Doctor's Brush Picks, an 3 inch plastic pick, tapered to a rounded point on one end and tiny bristles on the other, flexible. Extremely useful, public and private. No breakage. Does not leave debris. I use about six of these a day. Available from DENTIST.NET. Get a couple of travel 40 ct travel packs and a few 250 ct drums. I am not an agent.