Wheelchair

Object Details

Title: Wheelchair

Designer: Franklin D. Roosevelt

Maker: Unknown

Date: ca. 1931

Medium: Wood, steel, rubber

Dimensions: 37.5 x 16.875 x 37 in. (95.3 x 43 x 94 cm)

Catalog Number: HOFR 3042

 

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History

This wheelchair is nearly identical to a wheelchair at the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library. Both, according to family tradition, were designed by FDR. The wood seats of both chairs appear to be “little kitchen chairs” as described by Eleanor Roosevelt. The FDR Library wheelchair retains the original loose seat cushion and includes the addition of an ashtray attached to the underside of the seat. Minor variations between the wheelbases of these two chairs suggest that one might be the prototype for a commercially produced wheelchair sold by the Georgia Warm Springs Foundation. An advertisement appearing in the Polio Chronicle provides the brief history:

The chair pictured above is in general use at Warm Springs, having been introduced here by a patient. It is especially useful as a house chair and will go through even narrow doors. Previously, these chairs have been made for us only by special order and were not offered for sale. A surgical supply house is now building these for us and we are able to offer them for sale at $35.00 each.

We may speculate that FDR is the “patient” credited with the design, but nothing beyond family tradition and circumstantial evidence has surfaced to prove the attribution.

 

Left: Profile of FDR's wheelchair (HOFR 3042). NPS image. Right: Advertisement published in the Polio Chronicle, August 1931, depicting the armless wheelchair designed by a patient at Warm Springs. Photo courtesy of Roosevelt Warm Springs Vocational Rehabilitation Campus, Digital Library of Georgia.