Preliminary Inventory of the Willard Abraham Papers

Professor and special education expert Willard Bernard Abraham was born to Edward and Sadie (Rice) Abraham in Chicago, Illinois on May 18, 1916. He had two siblings, Alvin H. (1911-2008) and Rochelle (Abraham) Zuckerman (1921-2013). Willard Abraham earned his B.S. from the Illinois Institute of Technology (1940) and his M.Ed. from Chicago Teachers College (1942) before enlisting in the U.S. Army, where he earned the rank of Captain and worked in the Army Information Education Division in Washington, D.C. After World War II ended, Abraham returned to his education and earned his Ph.D from Northwestern University (1951).

In 1953, Abraham founded the Department of Special Education at Arizona State Teachers College (now Arizona State University), which he chaired for over 30 years. He was a widely recognized expert on special education and published several books on the topic, including A Guide for the Study of Exceptional Children (1956), A New Look at Reading (1957), Barbara: A Prologue (1958), Common Sense About Gifted Children (1958), The Slow Learner (1964), A Time for Teaching (1964), The Mentally Retarded Child and Educational Films (1966), The Preparation of BIA Teacher and Dormitory Aides (1968), A Study of the Devereux Foundation (1970), and Living with Pre-Schoolers (1976). He also wrote several books for the Army, among them Your Post War Career (1945) and Get the Job! (1946) as well as a nationally syndicated newspaper column titled Parent Talk that appeared until 1995.

Abraham married Dale [last name unknown] (1926-) and the couple had four children, Edward (1952-), Barbara (1954-1955), Andrew (1958-), and Amy (Abraham) Bacal (1962-). Willard Abraham died on January 23, 1999 at the age of 87 and is buried in Green Acres Memorial Park in Scottsdale, Arizona.