Remembering 1989 – The year Dental Auxiliary Placement Service was founded

In early 1989 DAPS, Inc. was operating out of a spare bedroom in Park Ridge. Within a few short months, the ‘company,’ (Karen and an assistant) opened what would later prove to be the first of three offices at 2 Talcott in Park Ridge. We had a few file cabinets, a typewriter, everything was mailed or faxed. We had no computers for the first few years, everything was on hard-copy. We kept track of shifts and staff on a very large whiteboard.

The median price of a home in 1989 was $120,00., with the average yearly household income being $27,450. A gallon of gasoline cost 97 cents, 1 LB of bacon was $1.90 and the Rolling Stones, Stevie Wonder and Otis Redding were inducted into the Rock and Roll hall of Fame.

Seinfeld made his television debut as did The Simpsons on Fox. Rain Man won an Oscar for Best Picture of the year and The Wind Beneath My Wings by Bette Midler won a Grammy for Song of the Year.

In the year 1989, the San Francisco 49ers were the Super Bowl Champs, and the Detroit Pistons beat the Los Angeles Lakers for the NBA Championship.

Here are the five most popular TV shows from 1989-90:

  1. The Cosby Show (NBC)
  2. Roseanne (ABC)
  3. A Different World (NBC)
  4. Cheers (NBC)
  5. The Golden Girls(CBS)

The most popular food of 1989 was tiramisu. Also trending and popular was;

French onion soup

Pasta salad

Quiche

Shrimp cocktails

SpaghettiOs

Sugar cookies and Sushi

In all seriousness, we would like to thank our clients, many of you who have been with us for 15-20(+) years. We have watched you gracefully grow, sell your practice and retire. While others of you, we first met while you were in dental school temping hygiene shifts for us. Thank you all for your loyalty.

To our candidates; over the years there have literally been thousands of you. Many of you have been temping with us for years, for others, a temp position turned into a perm position, while others still have found their ideal job working with our perm department. Thank you for registering with us, telling a friend or colleague about us – we hope this relationship has been a win / win for all involved.

And lastly, the staff at DAPS, like all offices has evolved, changed and transformed with the times. There have been some colorful people through the years in our office, many evolving from part time to full time, in and out of college, married and divorced; all of whom we have sincerely attempted to treat you like family. And to our current, somewhat scaled down staff of dedicated individuals – you are the reason DAPS remains a prominent and vital player in the Chicagoland dental community. We couldn’t have made it through this pandemic without you.

With love and thanks,

Karen Ociepka Anderson, RN – Founder & CEO

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