Olympic physician Hanley dies at 85 Bowdoin athlete was school’s doctor

BRUNSWICK – Dan Hanley, former chief physician to the U.S. Olympic team and among the first to recognize the dangers of steroids, died Sunday at Maine Medical Center in Portland. He was 85.

He was chief physician for several U.S. Olympic teams between 1960 and 1972. Hanley helped to develop protocols for drug testing in the Olympics.

A native of Amesbury, Mass., Hanley played football, baseball and hockey at Bowdoin College. He went on to serve as physician at his alma mater for 33 years.

After receiving his medical degree from Columbia, Hanley served in the Army Medical Corps during World War II. He later was executive director of the Maine Medical Association.

At Bowdoin, Hanley noticed that the standard heel cleat contributed to knee injuries. He went on to redesign the football shoe with a rubber heel and became an advocate for its use.

Hanley’s eye for athletics was reflected in the advice he gave his niece after she broke her knee skiing. He suggested she take up running.

In 1984, Hanley’s niece, Joan Benoit Samuelson, won the gold medal in the first women’s Olympic marathon.

Hanley was a 24-year executive secretary of the Maine Medical Association. He was first invited to the 1960 Summer Olympics in Rome after his work caught the eye of a longtime member of the International Olympic Committee. He went to Tokyo for the ’64 Games, was director of medical studies for the pre-Olympic Games in Mexico City in 1965 and was head physician for the ’67 Pan-Am Games in Winnipeg, the ’68 Winter Games in Grenoble, France, and the ’68 Summer Games in Mexico City.

He retired as Bowdoin’s physician in 1980, but still remained busy after that, which was pointed out in a NEWS’ story in 1980 by late sports editor Bill Warner.

“Dr. Dan, as he has been affectionately know by Bowdoin students for over three decades, has become almost as familiar a sight on the Bowdoin campus as the famed polar bear statue. However, he is far from stationary,” Warner wrote.

“Only recently returned from a visit to the Summer Olympic facility in Moscow, he will head for the Winter Village in Lake Placid, N.Y., again next week for another check of the progress there on the medical facilities,” the story said.

Hanley’s survivors include his wife, Maria, and their four children: Daniel Hanley Jr. of Baltimore, Sheila Hanley of South Portland, Sharon Hanley Vitousek of Kamuela, Hawaii, and Sean Hanley of Falmouth.

A funeral Mass will be celebrated Wednesday at St. Charles Borromeo Church in Brunswick.