There was a hospital in Marblehead, except the focus was less on treating souls than it was fixing soles.
Of course, I am talking about the Marblehead Shoe Hospital, which operated at 7 Atlantic Ave.
According to documents from the Massachusetts Cultural Resource Information System (MACRIS), the building was constructed by 1926. At that time, Wilfred Lemieux moved his shoe-repair shop from School Street to this location. His son, Wilfred A. Lemieux, took over.
It was when W. A. Lemieux became the head of the shoe-repair shop that the name was the Marblehead Shoe Hospital.
But who were the Lemieuxs, the people who could remedy Headers’ shoe woes?
Wilfred Lemieux was an immigrant from a French-speaking part of Canada. He first immigrated to Michigan as an infant in 1881, according to MACRIS. By 1901 he had moved to Salem and married Arzelia Lemieux née Gendron. Arzelia was the daughter of French Canadian immigrants and a shoemaker. She was born in Danielsonville, Conn.
Once married, the footwear-oriented couple purchased various properties in town for the residence and shoe-repair shops.
When the pair acquired what would become the Marblehead Shoe Hospital, it was 3 Atlantic Ave. The address would later change to 7 Atlantic Ave. as the town further developed.
The Lemieux family sold the building in 1989, and it changed hands throughout the rest of the 20th century and into the 21st century.
Now, it is no longer a hospital of any kind, but Marblehead House of Pizza. But maybe a cheesy slice can mend us in a different way.