WASHINGTON (AP) – Ben Bradlee is best known for leading the Washington Post’s Pulitzer Prize-winning Watergate coverage that knocked a president out of office.

But last week he spoke about a more personal struggle – one with polio.

Speaking at the National Press Club on Friday, the Boston native recalled being one of 24 teenagers at a Massachusetts boarding school who contracted the disease in the early 1930s. One close friend of his died, four others suffered permanent paralysis.

Bradlee was one of the lucky ones. After spending time in the hospital, he went home to recuperate and wait.

“The shrinks were all worried about why I didn’t react more to it. Why wasn’t I scared I was going to be paralyzed and never walk,” said Bradlee. “I come from Boston. We’ve got our nose to the grindstone down there.”

He said something inside him told him not to worry, and he had the support of a happy strong family.

He was bedridden for about four months, and said the only treatment he remembers is his father picking him up and putting him in a hot bath every morning and every night. But one day, with the help of a friend and his leg braces, he stood up. And slowly, he began to walk again, and suffered little long-term affects of the disease.

“I’m in pretty good shape now,” said Bradlee, 83. “I can’t run worth a damn, and I never could, so I don’t think it affected me a helluva lot.”

Bradlee and Anna Roosevelt, granddaughter of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, were speaking to commemorate the 50th anniversary of government approval of the polio vaccine by Dr. Jonas Salk.