Paula Hummel, LI autism advocate, dies

Paula Hummel's children say their mother just refused to believe the experts nearly 60 years ago who linked autism to ineffective parenting.

When her first son was diagnosed with autism in the early 1950s, the North Merrick mother cringed at experts who said the disorder was a result of "refrigerator mothers," women who were emotionally frigid.

"My mother was part of a generation of women who were being told that something was their fault," said Matthew Hummel, 51, of Wilmington, Del.

Paula Hummel, among a group of parents with autistic children who in 1958 helped form what today is The Center for Developmental Disabilities Inc., died Feb. 2 of complications related to dementia in Wilmington, family said. She was 85.

The nonprofit evolved from what was known in the mid-1950s as the Nassau Center for Emotionally Disturbed Children into an agency with campuses in Hicksville and Woodbury and 18 residential facilities on Long Island.

Today, most experts link autism to abnormal biology and chemistry in the brain, dispelling the "refrigerator" mom theory.

But Hummel knew in her heart the theory was ludicrous after the diagnosis of her eldest son, Darrell, now 59 and living in Niskayuna, north of Schenectady, said her daughter, Laurie Schraml, 55, of Phoenix.

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"She was a lion," Schraml said.

Hummel's children said some of their earliest memories were of their mother and others trying to create a sense of normalcy for their autistic children.

"I can remember separating macaroni for the children for their arts and crafts projects," Schraml said.

The first center was an old Levittown farmhouse, Matthew Hummel said, and his mother was in charge of the newsletter, and she would cut and paste the newsletter together at home and take the mock-up to a print shop in Merrick.

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His mother also helped recruit entertainment for dinner-dance fundraisers, and one of the headline acts for many years was comedian Alan King, who lived in Great Neck.

Hummel and her husband, Warren, also worked with the group to alter New York State education law so that it provided for children with developmental disabilities.

The family moved from North Merrick to Saratoga Springs in 1987, where Paula Hummel became a preaching deacon at St. Peter's Lutheran Church.

Hummel also is survived by four grandchildren. Her husband died in 2006.

A memorial service is April 30 at St. Peter's Lutheran Church in Ballston Spa, N.Y.