Charles Elder Rounds

Charles Elder Rounds, 92, South Shore Oral Surgeon, died on January 15 in Scituate Massachusetts. He was 92. The son of Frank Wendell Rounds and Mildred Elder Rounds, he was born in Louisville, Kentucky, and grew up in Winchester, Massachusetts. He graduated from Phillips Academy, Andover in 1937 and Princeton University in 1941 where he was goalie for the undefeated 1941 Ivy League Championship hockey team. Following graduation, he explored Greenland with Admiral Donald MacMillan and his wife Miriam aboard the Bowdoin. Miriam MacMillan chronicled the adventure in the book, Green Seas and White Ice.

He is the grandson of Dr. Isaac Rounds, a twice-wounded veteran of the 17th Maine Volunteer Infantry, who survived the battle of Gettysburg. After graduating from Tufts College Dental School, Charles Elder joined his father’s oral surgery practice. A lieutenant commander in the U.S. Navy, he served stateside during World War Two and married Winifred Porter of Higganum, Connecticut, on January 6, 1945. His practice was initially located at 403 Commonwealth Avenue in Boston. He and his father were authors of The Principles and Techniques of Exodontia, a seminal treatise on the art and science of oral surgery. During the Korean War he served in a M*A*S*H unit near the 38th parallel. Upon his return, he moved his practice to Weymouth, Massachusetts, where he was appointed president of the medical staff of the South Shore Hospital from 1984 to 1985. He had lived in the South Shore towns of Norwell, Scituate Harbor, and Hanover, where he served as senior warden at Saint Andrew’s Episcopal Church.

In his last years, he was lovingly cared for by the tireless staff of Life Care Center of the South Shore on the Driftway in Scituate.

He is the brother of the late Frank Wendell Rounds, Jr., author of the bestselling cold war memoir, A Window on Red Square. He is survived by his wife; a brother-in-law, Philip W. Porter, Jr.; three children, Charles, Kate, and Andrea; a daughter-in-law, Alicia; two grandsons, Chad and Mark; their wives Billie and Ariel, one great- granddaughter, Charlotte; his best buddy, Paul Kent; and the barflies at the Mill Wharf.

Funeral services will be held at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church in Scituate at 4 p.m., Monday, January 17. In lieu of flowers please send donations to the activities program at Life Care Center of the South Shore on the Driftway in Scituate.