Speaker: Dr. Richard D. Feldman
In 1902, while on an extended speaking tour, President Theodore Roosevelt was involved in a catastrophic carriage accident in Massachusetts that resulted in a serious injury to his left leg. That fateful injury would lead to continuing health problems for the rest of his life. The injury necessitated emergency surgery - first in Indianapolis, and soon after again in Washington, D.C.
This presentation, for the first time, provides a detailed medical justification for the leg injury being directly connected to his death more than16 years later.
The lecture is based directly on a recent article published in the Theodore Roosevelt Association Journal, coauthored by Drs. Richard D. Feldman and William H. Dick
Richard D. Feldman, MD, is a graduate of Indiana University, Bloomington, and a 1977 graduate of Indiana University School of Medicine. After completing one year of psychiatry residency at Indiana University, he finished his post-graduate medical training at Franciscan Health Indianapolis Family Medicine Residency in 1980.
He has had a long career as a family physician at Franciscan Health Indianapolis, where he served from 1981 to 2018 as program director of the family medicine residency program. He now continues as program director emeritus. He is an assistant clinical professor at Indiana University School of Medicine and an associate professor at the Marian University College of Osteopathic Medicine.
He served as Indiana's 20th state health commissioner from 1997 to 2001. He has received two Sagamores of the Wabash for his service to Indiana.
Sponsored by Benny Ko and Bill Dick
Program: The Wound that Would Not Heal: How Teddy Roosevelt Died
Speaker: Richard D. Feldman, MD, assistant clinical professor, IUSM; associate professor, College of Osteopathic Medicine, Marian University
Introduced By: Bill Dick
Attendance: NESC: 86, Zoom: 28
Guest(s): Ann Blunk, David and Mag Zauner, Tom Mote, Mark Williams
Scribe: Bill Dick
Editor: Ed Nitka
Talk’s Zoom recording found at: https://www.scientechclubvideos.org/zoom/02162026.mp4
Theodore Roosevelt was born in NYC in 1858. He became U.S. President after the assassination of President McKinley in September 1901. In 1902, he was determined to help the Republicans elect more candidates in the 1902 mid-term elections. He was the first President to do so.
While speaking in MA, his open horse carriage was struck by an electric train. Of those in the carriage, one man died, and all were injured. Roosevelt was thrown 30 feet and suffered many bruises. His glasses were found to be intact. He continued his trip through the south and eventually arrived in Indiana. A telegram was sent from Noblesville that a physician was needed.
Roosevelt was limping when he descended from the train at Union Station. After a carriage ride around Monument Circle, he spoke to the veterans of the Spanish-American War at Tomlinson Hall. 4,000 veterans heard his remarks. Then the party traveled to the Columbia Club where lunch was held. After lunch, TR spoke from the balcony (since remodeled) at the Club. He was quietly taken to St. Vincent Hospital for an exam of his injured leg. Roosevelt’s pain was from a seroma, a collection of fluids under the skin. After fluid was drawn out, he felt much better.
The rest of the trip was canceled, and a special train took him to Washington, DC. At the temporary White House, he worsened a week later with a high fever indicating infection. With an Orthopedic Surgeon assisting Roosevelt’s physicians, the muscle was cut open down to the bone and left open for drainage. He was confined to a wheelchair for eight weeks, under the watchful supervision of his wife, Edith. All White House business was conducted from Sagamore Hill, his home on Long Island.
Roosevelt had difficulty with the leg over the remaining 16 years of his life. In 1908, he wrote to his son, Kermit, that he had never gotten over the carriage accident in 1902. In 1916, at the Republican Convention, he had an attack of “pleurisy,” a probable pulmonary embolus. In 1918, his leg was infected, and he was placed on bed rest in the hospital for several weeks. There were no “blood thinners’ in 1918. There were no special X-rays to aid in diagnosis.
Dr. Feldman explained the circulation of the blood and showed a diagram explaining the site of a pulmonary embolus. The blockage prevents some oxygenation of blood that is sent to the ventricle to be pumped out to the body. He also listed the conditions that are risk factors for pulmonary emboli. After six weeks, on Christmas Day, Roosevelt was taken home. He resumed his reading and government work. But on the evening of January 18, and the early morning of January 19, he became ill and died. The cause was pulmonary embolus.
Both attendant James Amos and coachman Charles Lee were in attendance. Both had assisted Roosevelt in the White House. Struggling to maintain his emotions, Lee was heard to say, “I have lost the best friend that I ever had, and the best friend that any man ever had.”
Richard D. Feldman, MD
