Massage Therapist Sandra Newman Dies at 71 - The Provincetown Independent

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Massage therapist Sandra Claire Newman, a longtime resident of Provincetown, died on Oct. 18, 2024 at the Living Center of St. Petersburg in Seminole, Fla. She was 71 and had lived for many years with multiple sclerosis.

Sandra Newman. (Photo courtesy Carol Bower)

Her friends remember Sandy as a smart, irreverent, and playful character with a warm heart and a great sense of humor whose sensitive hands helped heal many bodies.

The daughter of Hyman and Helen (Adelstein) Newman of Chelsea and Swampscott, Sandy was born on Jan. 30, 1953 in Boston. She graduated from Chelsea High School in 1970 and attended college briefly before moving to the Outer Cape.

Sandy came to Provincetown with her friend John Rubera in the mid-1970s and lived here for more than 30 years, working as a baker at Café Edwige and the Lobster Pot and as manager of Outermost Kites.

In 1979, she and her then-partner Sue Harrison bought the 1850 house at 46 Creek Road and transformed it into the four-unit Sea Breeze Condominium, where she lived until 2009.

Sandy earned a certificate in massage therapy from the International Professional School of Bodywork in San Diego and opened Therapeutic Bodywork in Provincetown. She also spiced up John Rubera’s West End clothing store, Crôsyafingäs.

Sandy was diagnosed with relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis in her early 30s. She said it “rewired” her neurologically and gave her new perceptual abilities — the gift of reading people’s “energy” and knowing what was wrong with those who came to her for massage therapy and how best to help them.

She read books voraciously, loved her dogs, the ocean, and going fishing and often took long early-morning walks to collect sea glass on the beach at Herring Cove.

During her later years in Provincetown, she was mentored in oil painting by Rose Basile, who uncovered a new talent in Sandy. All of her artwork, along with several paintings by Basile, has been lost, according to friends.

In an online tribute to Sandy, Sue Harrison wrote, “Wherever your molecules are going, however your energy is choosing to express itself next, be at peace at least briefly, before reappearing as fireworks somewhere.”

Sandy is survived by siblings Todd Newman of Wimauma, Fla., Mark Newman of Boston, and Beth Newman of Amesbury; and by her devoted friends Carol Bower of Manchester, Conn., Sue Harrison of Fort Lauderdale, Fla. and Provincetown, and Susan Czapla of Lakewood Ranch. Fla.

Donations in Sandy’s memory may be made to the Carrie A. Seaman Animal Shelter in Provincetown.