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1938-1985 (Creation)
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Physical description
4.55 metres of textual and graphic records and published materials
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Biographical history
Helen Caroline Abell (1917-2005) was one of Canada’s first rural sociologists. Although she was born in Medicine Hat, Alberta, Dr. Abell was mostly raised in Toronto, Ontario. She attended the Macdonald Institute in Guelph, graduating in 1938, and went on to study home economics at the University of Toronto. During the Second World War, Dr. Abell served with the Canadian Women's Army Corp (1942-1945). After the war she studied at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, receiving a Ph.D. in Rural Sociology in 1951.
Upon graduation, Dr. Abell moved back to Canada to head the Rural Sociology Research Unit for the Economic Division of Canada’s Department of Agriculture. She held this position from 1952 to 1962. She moved on from there to teaching positions at the Ontario Agricultural College (1962-1967), the University of Waterloo (1967-1972), and the University of Saskatchewan (1973-1974). During her working and academic career, Dr. Abell became highly involved with international studies in the field of rural sociology. She completed projects for the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA), the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), and the Good and Agriculture Organization (FAO), taking her to rural parts of Jamaica, Nigeria, Columbia, Transkei (South Africa), Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Ghana, and Pakistan. For a time, she also worked for the United Nations as a Social Affairs Officer in their Community Development Group.
Dr. Abell published numerous studies and articles and became a renowned speaker and consultant in rural life, agriculture, and nutrition. In 1997, Dr. Abell was conferred an honourary doctor of laws degree from the University of Guelph. She died in 2005.
Custodial history
Scope and content
The Helen C. Abell collection, donated by Dr. Abell in 1984 and 2002, contains personal papers, correspondence, photographs, newspaper clippings, published and unpublished research and writings, rural sociology publications, and various conference and association papers and reports related to the career of Dr. Abell and to the study of rural sociology in Canada more generally.