Final Days
Death at Warm Springs
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"Confidentially, my plans are to be in Warm Springs, Georgia after March twenty-ninth, for a couple of weeks"
Editor's Note: Franklin Delano Roosevelt died in one of his favorite places. The quote above was part of a telegram he sent in 1945 less than a month before he suffered a fatal stroke in Warm Springs, Georgia.
Warm Springs was a solace for the President. FDR was initially attracted to the location in the 1920's due to its naturally warm spring waters. The site did not provide a cure for his paralysis but it did serve as a second home. He built the Little White House there in 1932.
Roosevelt financially supported the spa which was a place for those suffering from infantile paralysis to seek treatment and fraternize with others suffering from the same ailment. It was renamed the Roosevelt Warm Springs Institute for Rehabilitation in his honor in 1980.
FDR passed while he was having his portrait painted in Warm Springs. Interestingly, he provided detailed instructions concerning his passing in a letter composed in 1937.
