“I got my first partials when I was sixteen,” says Wardell Jones – a now 69-year-old man who received dentures from the Piedmont Dental grant this year. “I came from meager means. Growing up, the dentist just pulled teeth. He did nothing preventive like a root canal or cleaning.”

In the summer of 1965, Jones had a part-time job. One day on the streets of Cincinnati where he grew up, he passed a new dentist’s office. With school starting in a few months, Jones humbly entered and met with the dentist, asking if he could invent a payment plan that would get him partial dentures by the end of summer. After just two weeks, the dentist started taking his impressions. To his surprise, Jones was told “I trust you.”

He continued to pay off his debt over the remaining months. By the first week of school he had his smile. This early exchange proved formative in shaping Jones’s guiding principle: compassion begets compassion. “Love confronts you. It’s the creative essence; the stuff that manifests everything else.”

Out of his youth, Jones moved to Atlanta and became widely read in psychology and spirituality. He became deeply motivated to help others through teaching and mentorship. Young Jones blossomed into a tremendous community health worker, personally designing and spearheading multiple psychiatric and drug rehabilitation programs.

He carries cherished photos of him with President Bush and Vice President Quayle and impressive letters of commendation from his work with the Carter Center, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and the FBI drug reduction force, among many others. There is even a 1993 letter of thanks from Mercy Care in his collection. It is abundantly clear from his portfolio that though he came from “meager means”, he was undeniably valuable to society in his life’s work.

Unfortunately, though, society is not positioned to reward the working poor, and many who retire without adequate savings face great medical hardship. “I knew my teeth were getting bad and dental work is expensive. But you get self-conscious when you don’t have your smile,” Jones said. “I’m thinking ‘I don’t have any teeth, I don’t have any money, where am I going to go?’ …The long and short of it is that I needed help.”

Just a few months ago, Jones was walking in the Chamblee area and stumbled upon the Mercy Care Chamblee clinic. He went inside, and there discovered options for affordable dental care. He started receiving help immediately. He had his teeth cleaned and extracted first before being directed to Grady Hospital, a Mercy Care community partner, for oral surgery.

“The first few days after the surgery, I really started feeling better. Sometimes you don’t know you’re tip top until you get in to see a doctor and get a good once-over,” Jones said. Once his gums healed, he called down to his old friend at Mercy Care, Gerard Reid. Reid is a 19 year Mercy Care Resource Specialist III, and allocator of funds from the Piedmont Dental grant for $13,000 that benefitted 40 patients just like Jones. Reid walked Jones through the process of obtaining his now full set of dentures.

“I’m very grateful. It’s no small thing for me.”
With his smile fully restored, Jones feels confident about his next chapter.

“A lot of people want me to go back for a master’s degree,” Jones said. He had received his bachelors from Morris Brown College at the age of 51 in organizational management, and worked as a substance abuse counselor until retirement.

But he confesses his passion for singing jazz may be revitalized now that he is properly “equipped” with his new teeth. He hopes to pursue music as his next career choice.

“Let me leave you with a few notes,” Jones says as he parts ways. He tenderly begins to bellow the final lines of Nature Boy by Nat King Cole, echoing through the airy patient waiting area at Chamblee clinic.

“The greatest thing you’ll ever learn
Is just to love, and be loved in return.”