Maurice Roy was born on 24 December 1866. At 14, he entered
a dental surgery as an apprentice technician. In 1884, he enrolled
at the Dental School of Paris where he was awarded his diploma
in 1886. He became a tenured teacher in 1900. He passed his
baccalaureate. He then started medical studies. In order to meet his
own needs, he worked as a dentist. He was exempted from military
service because of his myopia; he was able to devote himself to
writing his thesis he sustained in 1894. When the Dreyfus Affair
broke out, at the cries of Zola in J’Accuse! published in 1898, he
signed the petition for the rehabilitation of the captain. Having
contributed towards the creation of FDI World Dental Federation
in 1901, he became a member of its executive body in 1904, then
its vice-president in 1911. He was re-elected to the post in 1936.
In 1902 he founded the French Dentists Cooperative Society
(Cooperative Society of Dentists of France), which supplied
equipments to the practitioners of the country. In 1914 he created
the relief committee for the wounded to the jaws and the face (Relief
Committee of the wounded of the jaws and the face). He dedicated
himself: he established surgical and prosthetic rehabilitation
protocols that were used by other centers. In 1915 he created the
Fraternal aid for French and Belgian war victims dentists (Fraternal
help to French dentists and Belgian victims of war). In 1923 he took
the lead of The Odontology magazine. Roy made it a key player in
dentistry of that time. Every themes were subjectively studied. In
1928 he left the public welfare [1-3].
On 28 July 1933, Roy made the executive body pass a motion
during FDI World Dental Congress in Edinburgh after Georges
Villain, his president and friend, gave a thundering speech to
denounce Nazi crimes and to help Jewish German dentists, that
stated that: “The executive body of FDI, that duly gathered in session
in Edinburgh on 28 July 1933 only to consider the protection of
rights obtained by dentists from all over the world thanks to the
diplomas granted by the competent authorities of their respective
countries [4], declared that no matter of race, of religion or of
politics under no circumstances must limit the liberty and the
practising of our duly qualified colleagues. Likewise, no restriction
which would lead them to breaches of their moral and professional
obligations must be imposed on them.” Having made everything
to help their colleagues although unsuccessfully the committee
passed this motion unanimously excluding Germany who chose
to withdraw from FDI. During the 1936 congress of Vienna, Roy
received the Miller Prize for his work: the highest distinction that
was awarded by the 33-member countries of the executive body
including Germany. He received the Legion of Honor this same
year. As they were shouted down during the 1938 congress, the
Germans were absent from the 1939 congress of Zürich [5]. While
the country was occupied, Roy hid aviators and Resistance fighters
in his house. While he was the head teacher of the Dental School of
Paris, he prohibited the wearing of the yellow star there, this could
have caused him an arrestation from the Pétainist font. During a
congress in Paris, he left the inaugural session just as the Germans
appeared. That provoked a tremendous outcry. While the demands
of the Germans were getting insistent, he stopped practicing his
dental surgery in 1942, but kept his positions at the Dental School
of Paris, at The Odontology magazine and at the Cooperative until
his death [6,7]. His convictions caused him insulting articles in
the Occupation newspapers: I’m everywhere. Because he was
suspected by the Gestapo, he received only routine visits. Maurice
Roy died on 5 January 1947 (Figures 1-6).
Figure 3: Dental School of Paris - 57, rue Rochechouart (public domain).
Figure 4: Congress of the Fédération Dentaire Internationale in Zurich, in 1939 (Ennis, 1967). Maurice Roy is in the 1st rank, 2nd
on the right. There is no German dentist in this meeting.
Figure 5: Reichszahnärzteführer Dr. Ernst Stück (1893 – 1974) (public domain).
Figure 6: VIIth congress of the German dentists directed by Ernst Stück in 1935, in Berlin (public domain).
Dreyfus H, Maurice Roy (1947) The Odontology (1866-1947).
Ennis John (1967) The story of the international dental federation
(1900-1962), FDI (Eds.), London.
Riaud Xavier (2005) German dentists in the Third Reich (German
dentists under the Third Reich), L’Harmattan (Eds.), Paris, France.
Riaud Xavier (2009) Georges Villain, President of the International
Dental Federation (Georges Villain, President of the International Dental
Federation (FDI). The Dentist-Dentist of France, p. 68-70.
(2011) Roy Nicole, Paris, France.
Sanz Javier (2006) Maurice Roy. Protagonists of Dentistry, p. 90-92.