Sybil Elgar

Sybil Elgar (10 June 1914 – 8 January 2007) was the first special-education teacher for those with autism in the United Kingdom.^[1]

In 1962, she began a school for autistic children in the basement of her London home.^[2] She helped to found the National Autistic Society, whose first school for pupils with autism was later named the Sibyl Elgar School in her honour.^[3] In 1974, Elgar and the parents of some of her students founded the first residential community for adults with autism, Somerset Court in Brent Knoll, Somerset.^[1][4] She was appointed MBE in 1975, and in 1984 she retired.^[2] Elgar died on 8 January 2007 at the age of 92.