Dr. William B. Carey, a long-time resident of Swarthmore and a pediatrician, child development researcher, and medical educator, died of congestive heart failure in Cathedral Village, Philadelphia, on July 26. He was 93.
Dr. Carey was best known locally as a dedicated practitioner of general pediatrics for 29 years in Media. His national and international reputation was based primarily on his behavioral research in the newly rediscovered field of children’s temperament differences and the considerable practical importance of those differences.
William Bacon Carey was born in Germantown. He graduated from Milton Academy, Yale University, and Harvard Medical School. His pediatric training took place at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, where he had been teaching part-time since 1960 and more extensively since 1989. A clinical professor of pediatrics at the University of Pennsylvania, Dr. Carey retired in August 2019.
Dr. Carey’s military service was first as a midshipman in the Merchant Marine Cadet Corps during World War II and later as a captain in the U.S. Army Medical Corps, based in Arizona.
In 1956, he married Ann Lord McDougal. They raised three daughters: Katharine Carey of St. Paul, Minnesota, Laura Carey of Philadelphia, and Elizabeth Carey of New York City. Ann died in December 2014. The family lived in Swarthmore for nearly 50 years.
Dr. Carey was the author, co-author, or co-editor of nine books and over 130 other publications, including book chapters, research papers, reviews, editorials, and commentaries.
Aside from being Phi Beta Kappa at Yale, his honors included two awards from the American Academy of Pediatrics: the Aldrich Award in Child Development and the Practitioner Research Award. In 1984, he was elected to the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences (now the National Academy of Medicine) in recognition of his large output of useful published behavioral research, which he undertook while engaged in a busy solo pediatric practice. He was for a time president of the Society for Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics.
He was also president of the Friends of Wyck, a historic house in Germantown, where a branch of his mother’s Quaker family had lived since 1690.
He is survived by three daughters, four grandchildren, and two great-grandchildren.
Dr. Carey was an avid opera fan. Donations in his name can be made to the Academy of Vocal Arts in Philadelphia.
A memorial service will be held at a later date.
