Some years ago I read the phrase "the spontaneous revulsion to the deformed." The phrase seemed to be both potent and provocative: Was there a spontaneous revulsion to disabilities in children or did such conditions evoke a more compassionate response?

Originally published in 1978, the problems of the disabled were no longer confined to the medical and educational professionals, but had become the concern of the community as a whole. Using terminology very much of the time, the author shows how attitudes towards different kinds of disability had developed at the time; they varied both...