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Rick Abrams, 57; cofounded pioneering firm

Aware to the benefits of exercise, Mr. Abrams also led efforts to connect walking trails in Lexington.Handout

Using a piece of plywood laid across a kitchen sink as a desk, Rick Abrams helped form a small education software business in the early 1980s, though he was modest about his own contributions.

“He was the kind of guy who would tell you he is not creative, and you would scratch your head and say, ‘You’ve had more creative ideas in the last five minutes than most have in a day,’ ” said Tom Snyder, his longtime business partner.

They founded Tom Snyder Productions, a pioneering company that brought educational technology into classrooms and went on to produce shows including the animated series “Dr. Katz: Professional Therapist,” which aired on the Comedy Central channel.

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“There was no educational technology. They had to invent it,” said Margery Mayer, president of Scholastic Education, which bought their Watertown-based company in 2001. Snyder and Mr. Abrams, she said, essentially helped launch what is now a multibillion-dollar industry. “They had to think about: ‘How do we charge for this, who is our customer, how do we take care of customer service?’ ”

Mr. Abrams, who also led efforts to connect walking trails in Lexington, died June 15 at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, nearly a decade after being diagnosed with thyroid cancer. He was 57 and lived in Lexington.

“He was really unique in the education industry because he was one of the first innovators in educational technology,” Mayer said.

Mr. Abrams, who had been general manager at Tom Snyder Productions, and who stayed after the acquisition into 2012, wanted to get to know everyone he worked with, even as the business grew from a half-dozen employees to 170.

His wife, Susan Kenyon, said a warehouse employee sent an e-mail about being hired as a 19-year-old high school dropout. He was approached one day by Mr. Abrams, who asked to see him upstairs. Convinced he was about to get fired, the employee followed him up the stairs, only to find the entire company waiting to shout “Happy Birthday!”

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Cheerful and upbeat, Mr. Abrams brought food he had labored over at home into the office lunchroom and made it clear that bonding over culinary experiences was an essential part of bringing people together, particularly in tough times.

“He was able to be a pied piper and lead people along,” Mayer said.

As a boss, Mr. Abrams “would give people the tools they needed to do their jobs and allow them to run with it, and that was the kind of leader he was,” his wife said.

Organization and keeping things clean were also important to Mr. Abrams, who often took out the trash. “He was the first to admit that he was a worrier. That was just part of his style,” Snyder said. “That’s why everything was so thoroughly taken care of.”

Richard D. Abrams spent part of his boyhood on a North Kingstown, R.I., chicken farm. When his parents bought The 1661 Inn on Block Island, R.I., Mr. Abrams and his siblings pitched in to help. He and his brother, Mark, who now lives in São Paulo, often worked long hours at The 1661 Sandwich Shoppe.

Gravitating toward the inn’s kitchen, Mr. Abrams even managed to take over at 14 when the chef burned his hand and was unable to work.

His sister, Rita Draper, who runs what is now The 1661 Inn and Hotel Manisses, said that early experience of treating guests and employees equally “instilled so many of the qualities that Rick possessed.”

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Mr. Abrams graduated from La Salle Academy in Providence in 1974 and received a bachelor’s degree from Colby College in 1978.

During the years before helping found Tom Snyder Productions, he worked for an economic research company in Philadelphia and moved to Boston to work for Data Resources Inc.

“He was unlike most people,” his sister said. “He loved to challenge his mind and learn from other people.”

In 1982, he married Kenyon, who said he had small, significant ways of showing people he cared about them. Every morning he made coffee, a gesture she said she always treasured.

Known for his deft touch at connecting people to jobs, and for making introductions that led to lasting friendships, Mr. Abrams helped run a book club in recent years that included friends from different parts of his life.

He liked to couple book themes with cuisine for club gatherings. With a Russian spy novel, for example, he would buy food from a Russian grocery store. He also invited authors to visit, and other interesting guests with a connection to a book’s topic.

For Mr. Abrams, cooking was “an art form, but also a way to explore other cultures, to push his creative boundaries,” said James Rosenfield, a neighbor and longtime friend. “Meals were always very special at Rick’s house. His kitchen was like a sanctuary.”

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Mr. Abrams had served as a corporation member of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute, and belonged to local groups including the Sustainable Lexington Committee and Lexington Global Warming Action Coalition. After his diagnosis, he served as the only patient member of the International Thyroid Oncology Group.

He discovered a lump on his throat in 2004 while shaving and was soon diagnosed with thyroid cancer.

“I remember, even until the last minute, you didn’t think he was going to die because of his positive attitude,” said Ramel Rones, a Tai Chi master with whom Mr. Abrams studied.

“When you’re first diagnosed, you’re looking for the cure, you’re looking for the guarantee that you’re going to be OK,” Mr. Abrams said in a video posted on the oncology group’s website, itog.org/patient-stories. “So as a patient, you do have to get over that guarantee concept to the point where you can be happy to live with hope.”

A service has been held for Mr. Abrams, who in addition to his wife, brother, and sister leaves two sons, Archie of San Francisco and Stanley of Cambridge; a daughter, Sydney of Lexington; and his father, Justin of Block Island.

Long a devotee of walking, Mr. Abrams tweeted links to articles about the health benefits of foot travel, and he helped Lexington’s Greenway Corridor Committee connect the town’s walking trails. The ACROSS Lexington program, or accessing conservation land, recreation areas, open space, schools, and streets, offers increased signage and printed maps.

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“I think it’s going to provide a wonderful, new way for people to get a great recreation opportunity, get people out of their cars more, and make it really easy to get around Lexington without needing their car,” he said in a 2012 interview with wickedlocal.com.

Mr. Abrams “had a positive, healthy, community-oriented vision that was contagious. He also had a style of presentation that was so enthusiastic and polite and civil and upbeat. He was a rarity,” said Deb Mauger, chairwoman of Lexington’s Board of Selectmen.

“The vision will live on and will be expanded because of his work,” she added. “He leaves a true legacy.”


Emma Stickgold can be reached at estickgoldobits@gmail.com.