Charlotte Maguire's Wisdom for Today

Dr. Charlotte Maguire gives a whole new meaning to the notion of “golden years.” At 90, after a brilliant career in medicine and government, she’s still in love with learning — and still inspiring others to learn. “A pioneer for women in medical sciences and an inspiration for future doctors,” said Sandy D’Alemberte, former president of Florida State University, on awarding Maguire an honorary doctorate in 2002. “She has dedicated her career to caring for those who needed it most — minorities, disabled children and the indigent — and has helped FSU establish a medical school where that philosophy will flourish.” Now an artist specializing in wildlife studies, Maguire also is a philanthropist and virtual pioneer. Her latest project: the Maguire Center for Lifelong Learning at Westminster Oaks Active Living Community, where she lives. The 10,000-square-foot center has a high-tech virtual library, a 350-seat auditorium, a computer lab and a bistro. It was seeded with $1 million from Maguire, the largest lifetime gift ever to Westminster Oaks, and is estimated at $4.3 million in all.

Meet Charlotte Maguire ‘An energy field of ideas,’ this former doctor has a wealth of wisdom to share By Margie Menzel Originally published in the Apr/May 2010 issue of 850 Business Magazine

Dr. Charlotte Maguire gives a whole new meaning to the notion of “golden years.” At 90, after a brilliant career in medicine and government, she’s still in love with learning — and still inspiring others to learn.

“A pioneer for women in medical sciences and an inspiration for future doctors,” said Sandy D’Alemberte, former president of Florida State University, on awarding Maguire an honorary doctorate in 2002. “She has dedicated her career to caring for those who needed it most — minorities, disabled children and the indigent — and has helped FSU establish a medical school where that philosophy will flourish.”

Now an artist specializing in wildlife studies, Maguire also is a philanthropist and virtual pioneer. Her latest project: the Maguire Center for Lifelong Learning at Westminster Oaks Active Living Community, where she lives. The 10,000-square-foot center has a high-tech virtual library, a 350-seat auditorium, a computer lab and a bistro. It was seeded with $1 million from Maguire, the largest lifetime gift ever to Westminster Oaks, and is estimated at $4.3 million in all.

“She just wants to motivate other senior citizens to be active and have something to enjoy,” said Pam Wilson, Westminster’s development officer.

“We’ve got to stimulate their brains!” Maguire said.

Charlotte Edwards Maguire has been a pathfinder for women all her life. Born in 1918, she studied at Stetson University and earned her bachelor’s degree from Memphis Teachers College in 1940. After graduating from the medical school at the University of Arkansas in 1944 — the only woman in her class — Maguire went to Orlando, where she founded one of the state’s first pediatric clinics. “Orlando’s first girl doctor returns,” read the headline in the local paper. She married Raymer Francis Maguire, a highly successful Orlando attorney, in 1948, and they had two children.

Charlotte Maguire, a Quaker, was always a powerful advocate for children with disabilities, providing her services free to those in need.

She served in such groundbreaking roles as chief of staff for the Central Florida Division of the Children’s Home Society and, in 1952, became the first woman president of the Florida Pediatric Society. From 1965 to 1968, she was chief of pediatrics at Orlando’s Mercy Hospital. After 25 years in private practice, Maguire was asked to come to Tallahassee in the administrations of Gov. Claude Kirk and then Gov. Reubin Askew.

“I really didn’t know much about politics at that time, and what could happen to you in Tallahassee, but it didn’t take too long,” Maguire laughed.

She learned the ropes so thoroughly that she went on to become a high-ranking official in the administration of President Richard Nixon: assistant regional director for the U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare. In 1975, Maguire returned to Tallahassee as medical services director at the then-Department of Health and Rehabilitative Services, which she helped to create. She then served in a similar post at the Division of Worker’s Compensation at the state Department of Labor. After seven years on the clinical staff of the University of Florida’s Department of Pediatrics, Maguire retired from practicing medicine at age 70.

But she has never retired from science or scholarship. At the Nov. 14, 2009, grand opening of her namesake center at Westminster Oaks, the auditorium was jammed. Among the celebrants: former state Rep. Marjorie Turnbull, who as a child knew and admired Maguire.

“When I think of the concept of lifelong learning, I think of an energy field of ideas,” Turnbull said. “And I can see the Maguire Center as the locus of that energy field for all of Tallahassee. There will be courses and concerts and plays and (you will only be) constrained by your imaginations … This center, this auditorium, will be in constant demand.”

Maguire had already given FSU a state-of-the-art virtual medical library. In 1999, she donated $1 million to create the dean’s chair and endow student scholarships at what was then the university’s Program in Medical Sciences. She came forward with a separate gift for two full-tuition scholarships to lure outstanding medical students to Tallahassee. After advocating for the establishment of FSU’s College of Medicine, she gave another $1 million to endow a chair in geriatrics. She has been called “the mother of Florida State’s medical school.”

“I could talk for days about her contributions,” said Alma Littles, the medical school’s associate dean for academic affairs. “Implementing a distributed model of medical education where students are able to learn in the communities where the patients are was made much easier with an online library than it would have been if we had to create traditional libraries with hard-copy textbooks and journals at each of our regional campuses.

“With the virtual library, students can access medical information at the point of care, including in the exam room and at the bedside,” Littles said.

Maguire also established a scholarship fund for Westminster Oaks employees to train as certified nursing assistants, LPNs and RNs, with an eye to returning to the retirement community.

An avid reader who loves to take walks with her dog, Windy, Maguire jokes about starting in pediatrics and winding up in geriatrics. Her earliest patients stayed with her past their childhoods, some until they were in college. “Didn’t want to go to a grown-up doctor,” Maguire said with a laugh. Decades later, she relished learning geriatrics. “I thoroughly enjoyed it. I studied rehabilitation, and then geriatrics was my theme.”