Last updated: July 28, 2023
Article
FDR, Wheelchairs, and Diplomacy
President Franklin D. Roosevelt and King Ibn Saud of Saudi Arabia aboard the USS Quincy at Great Bitter Lake in Egypt. Courtesy of the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum.
With the end of the Second World War in sight, President Franklin D. Roosevelt met with the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Sir Winston Churchill, and the Premier of the Soviet Union, Joseph Stalin, in February of 1945. The “Big Three” met at Yalta to discuss the reorganization of the European geopolitical landscape after the inevitable fall of Nazi Germany, Soviet involvement in the Pacific Theatre of the war against the Empire of Japan, and the framework of the United Nations.
Along his voyage back to the United States, after the conclusion of the Yalta Conference, President Roosevelt met King Ibn Saud of Saudi Arabia on February 14, 1945. The two leaders met aboard the USS Quincy, while the destroyer passed through the Suez Canal. During their conference, the President and the King discussed political challenges faced by Middle Eastern nation, such as: the settlement of European Jewish refugees, fleeing persecution, in Palestine; European colonialism in the Middle East and the struggle for sovereignty; and efforts to increase agriculture through improved irrigation in the region.1
President Franklin D. Roosevelt and King Ibn Saud of Saudi Arabia aboard the USS Quincy at Great Bitter Lake in Egypt. Courtesy of the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum.
Newspaper and State Department accounts of the meeting indicate that the two heads of state opened a productive dialogue and shared warm, friendly feelings during a very successful audience. The leaders also exchanged gifts as a sign of good faith and mutual respect before their summit; President Roosevelt’s gift to King Saud did not go unnoticed by the press.
William Eddy, the American Minister to Saudi Arabia, was instrumental in arranging the meeting and acted as a translator for the President. In a letter to the Secretary of State, Eddy recorded the friendly nature of the discussion and, specifically, the presentation of the wheelchair to the King:
“During the more informal visit on deck before lunch (11:30 to 1:00 p.m., February 14) a very friendly relationship was quickly established. The King spoke of being the “twin” brother of the President, in years, in responsibility as Chief of State, and in physical disability. The President said, “but you are fortunate to still have the use of your legs to take you wherever you choose to go.” The King replied, “It is you, Mr. President, who are fortunate. My legs grow feebler every year; with your more reliable wheel-chair you are assured that you will arrive.” The President then said, “I have two of these chairs, which are also twins. Would you accept one as a personal gift from me?” The King said, “Gratefully. I shall use it daily and always recall affectionately the giver, my great and good friend.”2
The personal histories and backgrounds of the two leaders brought them close together. But it was their shared experiences with disability and the offering of the wheelchair that cemented their fast friendship. Eddy again recalled the exchange, in more detail, in a book on the meeting that was publish in 1954:
“The King and the President got along famously together. Among many passes of pleasant conversation I shall choose the King’s stamen to the President that the two of them really were twins: (1) that were both of the same age (which was not quite correct); (2) they were both heads of states with grave responsibilities to defend, protect and feed their people; (3) they were both at heart farmer, the President having made quite a hit with the King by emphasizing his rural responsibilities as the squire of Hyde Park and his interest in agriculture; (4) they both bore in their bodies grave physical infirmities – the President obliged to move in a chair and the King walking with difficulty and unable to climb stairs because of wounds in his legs… Whenever the King took friends through his palace at Riyadh, if there were close friends, he showed them his private apartment where his wheelchair rested with the White House tag still on it. The King always said, “This chair is my most precious possession. It is the gift of my great and good friend, President Roosevelt, on whom Allah has had mercy.” The King who later used a wheelchair, did not use thus gift chair which was built for the very slight and frail F.D.R. and could never be used by the King, a man of terrific physique and stature.”3
King Ibn Saud seated in a wheelchair. ArabNews image.
Shortly after his audience with President Roosevelt, King Saud held a summit with Prime Minister Winston Churchill to discuss similar issues about the future of the Middle East. King Saud and Churchill didn’t share the same pleasant meeting that Saud had experienced with President Roosevelt. The British attempted to outshine the Americans with a larger ship and a grander display, which Saud apparently found “dull” and off-putting. He preferred the more engaging and personal atmosphere provided by his American hosts and President Roosevelt. King Saud, by all accounts, was extremely touched by FDR’s present of his own wheelchair. President Roosevelt also enjoyed his encounter with King Saud and found their conversation to be productive: according to the White House, FDR said, “[I] learned more about [the Near East] by talking with Ibn Saud for five minutes than I could have learned in an exchange of two or three dozen letters.”4
In regard to this groundbreaking gift, one newspaper printed: “A new disclosure today was that the President gave King Ibn Saud a wheel chair the King had coveted. It was probably the first such gift in history between two chiefs of state.”5 By exhibiting this cherished souvenir and sharing the story to his closest friends, King Saud literally put his personal affection, admiration, and gratitude towards Roosevelt on display.
The State Department also notes that the wheelchair that President Roosevelt gave to King Saud was too small, “and the President requested Mrs. Roosevelt to arrange for a shipment of a new one to the King. This was done in August 1945.”6
Documentation in the archives of the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library further confirms Eddy’s and newspaper reports. According to page 46 of the log of the USS Quincy’s trip to Crimea: “During his visit the President presented the King a gold Fourth-Term Inaugural Medallion (with special leather case) and also one of his wheel-chairs which had attracted the King’s fancy.”
On March 1, 1945, FDR addressed Congress for the final time. During the speech, the President reported on the success of the Yalta Conference, his encounters with Middle Eastern leaders, the nearing end of the war in Europe, and his goals for lasting world peace through the United Nations. President Roosevelt entered the chamber of the House of Representatives in a wheelchair; the President remained seated for the duration of the speech and apologized to the assembly, explaining it was difficult to walk to the podium with the heavy weight of his leg braces which allowed him to stand by locking his legs firmly in place.7
Part of King Ibn Suad's entourage boarding the USS Quincy during FDR's visit to Great Bitter Lake, Egypt. Courtesy of the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum.
One newspaper reporter, Jack Stinnett, covered the March 1 address and FDR’s gift of his wheelchair to King Saud. Stinnett noted the media’s previous “understanding” that the extent of the President’s paralysis and disability was not to be covered, and questioned why Roosevelt was making such a public gift of the wheelchair and had made a direct reference to his limited mobility during the President’s address to Congress just days after FDR’s return from Yalta:
“For more than 12 years, without any specific taboos, there has been an understanding that no stories or pictures would be circulated playing on Mr. Roosevelt’s infirmity.
Why then suddenly, has he approved the release of such stories as that from the Mediterranean when he gave Ibn Saud of Saudi Arabia a wheel chair like his own? Why has he so far dropped the veil as to apologize in what may have been his most widely circulated public address before Congress the other day for remaining seated and explaining that its was easier, because to stand, he had to carry ten pounds of painful steel braces on the lower part of his legs?”
According to many reporters that covered the President, the American press had agreed not to photograph or film the President using one of his wheelchairs. The press had mentioned, in passing, FDR’s experience with polio and had even commented on his reliance on wheelchairs, but in many cases, Roosevelt’s health and ability were not the focal point of the story. Papers and footage often depicted the President standing with the use of a cane or with the aid of one of his sons or assistance from a military official, giving the impression that he had, at least partially, overcome his paralysis caused by polio.8 Stinnett calls attention to the President presenting the wheelchair to King Saud and his seated appearance during Roosevelt’s address to Congress because it was a rare occasion in which FDR himself publicly acknowledged the “open secret” of his disability.9
“The answer, say friends and political associates, is that the President is through with running for office and even with any further personal participation in politics other than perhaps giving his nod to some one who may seek to succeed him.”10
Stinnett asserts that President Roosevelt is no longer hiding his condition because FDR is no longer running for reelection: FDR isn’t being forced to conceal his wheelchairs (which were designed to be small and discrete) or his disability because he is free from future electoral repercussions. Yet, American voters were aware, to a certain extent, of the President’s battle with polio and his limited mobility. American voters still elected FDR to a record setting four terms in office, making Roosevelt the longest serving President in American history. In the case of American-Saudi relations, FDR’s use of his wheelchairs proved to be politically advantageous in forging diplomatic ties between two nations that lasted through the second half of the twentieth century and continue into the twenty-first century.11
Poetically, March 1, 2008, the 63rd anniversary of FDR being wheeled into the Capitol Building and giving his seated address before Congress, became the first observance of International Wheelchair Day.
Seth Frost, Museum Technician, Roosevelt & Vanderbilt National Historic Sites
President Roosevelt addresses Congress after the Crimean Conference, March 1, 1945. Image courtesy of the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum.
Endnotes
2 Minister to Saudi Arabia William A. Eddy to Secretary of State Edward Stettinius Jr., March 3, 1945; State Department, Office of the Historian Foreign Relations of the United States: Diplomatic Papers, 1945, The Near East and Africa, Volume VIII - Office of the Historian
3 Eddy, F.D.R. Meet Ibn Saud, page 27 FDR MEETS IBN SAUD : WILLIAM A. EDDY : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive
4 A Look Back at the U.S.-Saudi Friendship – The White House (archives.gov)
5 "FDR Hope For A Peace To Permit Disarmament," The Wilmington Morning Star, Wilmington, NC, page 2, March 1, 1945, The Wilmington morning star. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1909-1990, March 01, 1945, FINAL EDITION, Page 2, Image 2 « Chronicling America « Library of Congress (loc.gov).
6 Department of State, Office of the Historian, Foreign Relations of the United States: Diplomatic Papers, 1945, The Near East and Africa, Volume VIII - Office of the Historian.
7 President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Final Address to a Joint Session; United States House of Representatives; President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Final Address to a Joint Session | US House of Representatives: History, Art & Archives
8 "The Myth of FDR’s Secret Disability,|TIME.com
9 FDR and Polio - FDR Presidential Library & Museum (fdrlibrary.org).
10 Jack Stinnett, “Stinnett Hears FDR Is Out in ’48; Wil Not Be Candidate,” The Daily Alaska Empire, March 27, 1945, pages 1 and 6, The Daily Alaska empire. [volume] (Juneau, Alaska) 1926-1964, March 27, 1945, Page SIX, Image 6 « Chronicling America « Library of Congress (loc.gov)