It’s still summer in Marion for a few more weeks, and many residents, their guests, and savvy seasonal visitors are enjoying beautiful Sippican Harbor for sailing and fishing, and for the unrivaled pleasure of swimming (or floating, or simply playing) in Sippican’s temperate salt water. Some include a swim as part of their regular summer regime, taking a quick dip to greet the day, while others ambitiously swim laps around the inner harbor for their morning exercise. At least one current intrepid resident swims daily almost year round! In 1925 and 1926, Dr. William McDonald, a Providence physician who summered in Marion and later moved to Marion permanently, prescribed swimming as an ideal therapy routine for a fellow Marion summer resident who was battling polio – Franklin Delano Roosevelt.
A graduate of Brown University and Columbia University, Dr. McDonald was the consulting neurologist at Sayles Memorial Hospital in Pawtucket, RI from 1905 -1921, and a specialist in infantile paralysis, or polio. FDR sought McDonald’s help in his own struggle with the disease, and became both McDonald’s patient and his friend. In 1925 and 1926, Roosevelt spent time on the Willibud Farm in Wareham so he could visit his doctor daily in Marion. According to information found in the SHS archives, Dr. McDonald recommended daily swims in Sippican Harbor off his own private pier (seen in the photos above), in addition to other water therapies that he devised specifically for Roosevelt. A fellow patient, Mussetta Clark, remembered that Dr. McDonald’s treatments could seem somewhat unsympathetic. “The first thing he asks a patient is, ‘Can you swim?’ . . . If you can’t, he throws you overboard and makes you.” Another therapy involved the use of a 10-foot plank with handrails that Roosevelt used to exercise his muscles, paralyzed since 1921. Because both men loved sailing, this “walking board . . . later served as gangplank when [Roosevelt] visited his old friend and physician in 1933, at the outset of a summer cruise on the Amberjack II.”
Dr. McDonald died in 1936 at the age of 63. His obituary, with more details of his life and his friendship with FDR, can be found in the SHS archives, as well as the article quoting Mussetta Clark, photos of FDR in his visits to Marion, and a scrapbook of FDR’s visit in 1933. Search our online database using the keyword “Roosevelt” or “McDonald, William (Dr.)” to find these and more photos and articles. Click here for Dr. McDonald’s obituary.
Click here for the photo of FDR aboard Amberjack II.
And remember that you are always welcome to view these items in person at the Sippican Historical Society!