The Society of Teachers of Family Medicine Group on Oral Health released Smiles for Life: A National Oral Health Curriculum for Family Medicine in October 2005 to address a need for high-quality residency and medical school curricula in an area of documented physician knowledge deficit. This article describes the background, planning, fund-raising, development, dissemination, and impact of the curriculum. Lessons learned, particularly in the areas of long-distance collaboration, fund-raising, and marketing are reviewed with a goal of serving as a model for future curriculum development efforts.