Michigan head football coach Jim Harbaugh has addressed his interactions with the late physician Robert Anderson, who worked at UM from 1968-2003 and has now been accused by dozens of sexual abuse.
"Dr. Anderson was our family doctor for us as kids, I was 9 or 10 years old, Dr. Anderson, Dr. Graves was the other family doctor,” Harbaugh said Wednesday during a Zoom call with reporters according to the Detroit Free Press. "Those two doctors. And then also when I played here at Michigan, Dr. Anderson was the team doctor. Took a physical for every youth sport that I played and also when I was here in college for football, yearly physical.
"Never saw anything inappropriate, nor did I ever hear anything that was inappropriate about Dr. Anderson. Never experienced anything inappropriate, never heard any time where there was anything inappropriate by Dr. Anderson."
Related: Michigan Contacting Thousands About Medical Abuse
Anderson, who died in 2008, was the former director of the University Health Service. He’s been posthumously accused by former students and athletes of sexual abuse during medical exams.
Chuck Christian, who played on the football team from 1977 to 1980was the first football player to come forward with allegations of the abuse. Since then, the University has launched its own investigation into the matter, reaching out to thousands of former students and athletes to ask whether they experience abuse.
“I loved my years there,” Christian told the Free Press. “They were some of the greatest years of my life. It’s just unfortunate that Dr. Anderson has left this stain on my memory of this school. But it was him. It wasn’t the overall program. It was one bad apple.”
The university’s investigation is ongoing, and a federal lawsuit has been filed against Anderson in Detroit.
