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could get the use of his legs back, they all encouraged him to believe that he could learn to walk and that he could recover this muscular strength, or at least some of it.
He, himself, discovered Warm Springs. He had reached the point where even a quack could reach him if it had anything to do with paralysis. He had heard about this miraculous spring and he was in a state of mind to believe in this miraculous spring that had cured the Indians of every known disease, including paralysis. So he believed. The doctors all said, “Sure, exercise is ‘it.' Exercise, swimming in warm water is just fine.” To this day they put them in warm water to swim. Swimming is almost the only exercise that a paralyzed person can take. Insofar as they have any nerve fibre left, and some of the nerve centers haven't been destroyed, that does gradually reeducate the muscles and redevelop the muscles, if there's anything left to work on. In his case it certainly strengthened him, whatever else it did. He was greatly strengthened.
I suppose to a large extent his improvement, both there and afterwards, was the stimulus of his belief that he was going to be cured. He believed faithfully that he was going to get all right.
Basil O'Connor never knew anything about Warm Springs until after Roosevelt got down there. It was after they got
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