Born: May 14, 1881
Died: February 22, 1974
Location: Lot 17, Section 1, Row 2, Old Cemetery-NW
Picture provided by Michelle Setlik
Picture provided by Michelle Setlik
Picture provided by Maxine Rathman Collection
Grand Island (Nebraska) Independent
Saturday, 23 February 1974
WOOD RIVER – Funeral services for Sabra J. Abbott, Wood River, librarian for 35 years before retiring in 1965, will be held Monday, 1:30 p.m. here at the Apfel Funeral Home. Miss Abbott, 92, died early Friday at a Lincoln hospital. The Rev. Donald Bennett will officiate. Burial will be in Wood River Cemetery. Memorials are suggested for the Wood River Presbyterian Church.
Miss Abbott was born may 14, 1881, on the Abbott homestead four miles south of Wood River to Marcus and Carrie (Weldon) Abbott. She was the last living member of the class of 1897, Wood River High School. Miss Abbott attended Grand Island Baptist College, and during World War I, she worked as a librarian in Washington, D.C. She later returned to Nebraska to teach at the Wood River public school, where she was principal and later served as superintendent. She was a member of the Wood River Presbyterian Church and was affiliated with the Eastern Star of Wood River for the past 72 years. Survivors include one brother, Roscoe C. Abbott of Lincoln; one nephew, one niece and a cousin.
Sabra Abbott written by Michelle Setlik
Sabra Jane was born to Marcus and Carrie (Weldon) Abbott on May 14, 1881, at the Abbott family homestead, located four miles south of Wood River. She was named after her paternal grandmother. Sabra received her early education in the Wood River area and was named the Class of 1897 valedictorian of Wood River High School. Sabra continued her education at the Grand Island Baptist College where she attained her degree in 1902.
While working at the state industrial school for girls in Geneva, Sabra received an appointment in November 1911 to the Carnegie Library in Washington DC where she apprenticed as an assistant librarian for a year before working in the cataloging department for another year. Upon her return to Nebraska, Sabra taught in schools at Fairbury, Chadron, and Wood River. In 1918, she was appointed the principal of Wood River High School.
After 15 years in education, Sabra resigned her post as the Superintendent of Wood River Schools and became the librarian at the Wood River Public Library in 1928. Except for a brief stint when she served as the librarian at the Grand Island College from 1930-1931, during which time her mother Carrie Abbott took up her post in Wood River, and a six-year period in the 1940s when she resumed her teaching position at the Wood River High School, due to a teacher shortage during the war years, Sabra served as Wood River’s librarian until her retirement.
Sabra’s legacy includes expanding not only the collection of the library, first established in 1905, but also expanding the building itself. On August 23, 1964, the Maltman Memorial Library, named after Sabra’s cousin and major donor W.W. Maltman, was dedicated. The new library offered 1,500 square foot of floor space, which Sabra continued to fill with over 6,000 books until she retired in June 1965 at the age of 84.
When Sabra passed on February 22, 1974, she was remembered as the last living member of the Wood River High School Class of 1897. At the Alumni banquet later that spring it was voted to establish a memorial fund in honor of Sabra Abbott, an alumnus and longtime teacher at the school. Additional memorials provided to the community in Sabra’s name supported the library including a 1985 endowed fund through Wood River Centennial Community Foundation to support the Maltman Memorial Library that was established by her niece and nephew in memory of Sabra and her brother and sister-in-law Roscoe and Hazel (Gooden) Abbott.
Sabra was remembered as a “revered teacher, principal and public librarian for many years” in the Wood River Community who not only championed the library but used her own personal funds to assist the library in keeping the doors open through the depressed 1930s.