The Angle Orthodontist: 10 Years Later

Abstract

In 2000, at the turn of the millennia, I arrived at the editor’s desk and the stewardship of The Angle Orthodontist. This then 70 year old illustrious journal had a new steward—me, an editorially untested rookie. I thank that Foundation Board and those who were willing to take this risk for it has been a great ride. In preparing for my interview, I remember searching the Internet and discovering that the publication world was in turmoil. The digital age was upon us and some aspects of the publication world were being dragged kicking into the new digital era. Historically our journal had insisted upon receiving manuscript submissions as three paper copies— double spaced typewritten pages. A copy was mailed to two prospective reviewers, (our previous editor, Dave Turpin, had the foresight to bring us into the anonymous peer review system) and they mailed back their responses. The reviews were then mailed to the author who would revise and resubmit. At this point we were often ready to send the manuscripts were often ready to go to the printer. But typesetters were already a thing of the past. The printers were working in digital format so we required the authors to submit a floppy disc which we then sent to the printer. What’s wrong with this picture? Clearly if you need to end up in digital format, you might as well start in a digital format. Submission and review programs were just becoming available and we were early adopters of the one offered by our printer. This greatly accelerated the process and the manuscript submission number increased every year thereafter. The next step was the transfer of all of our back issues on to the Internet. That was followed by an incredible jump in hits on our Website. The need was always out there—access was the problem. This number has stabilized at around three million hats per year. Where does all of this interest come from? It is surprisingly from areas you might not expect. Just look at the Table of