He know them not by their faces or their names. He knows them by the content of their mouths.

“I can remember their mouths and the details of their treatment more than their faces,” he laughed.

Wingham’s only dentist, Dr Stockard, has retired after 33 years of service to the Wingham community.

Throughout his career, he has treated three, sometimes four, generations of Wingham families.

His life in the dynamic and challenging profession has been punctuated by his strong advocacy for the Wingham Brush.

Dr Stockard’s name is synonymous with the restoration of the town’s rainforest, which he fought hard for throughout the 1980s and ’90s.

The practice closed its doors for the final time on Wednesday, June 25.

“There was no fanfare, we just had to tie up some loose ends,” Dr Stockard said.

John grew up in Sacramento, California, and graduated from dentistry school at San Francisco 34 years ago.

It was here that he met his future Australian wife Stephanie.

Stephanie’s parents had retired to Taree, and when they visited to Australia, Wingham captured his interest – mostly because of the the Brush.

“I’d had enough of the States at that time. It was a madhouse.

“Wingham Brush sold me on the place.”

At that time, the mid-1970s, the Wingham Brush was a very different place to how it looks today.

The abundant native plants were enveloped in South American exotic vines that were strangling the Brush to the point where the ecosystem could have been lost forever.

“It was such a strange thing to have this rainforest right in the middle on town. I thought ‘This is really wild’. It was very impressive – this rainforest shrouded in weeds.

“That it was home to these conspicuous flying foxes was such a remarkable thing – and it still is.”

Dr Stockard fell in love with the town started practicing here in July of 1975.

He bought what was then a run-down dental practice on the corner of Primrose and Canget Streets, which was actually run out of Port Macquarie.

He stayed there for about 10 years before building the Isabella Street complex which has been home to the practice ever since.

Dr Stockard raised his family in Wingham, lived here throughout his working life and plans to stay here in retirement.