Image Gallery: Tim Nugent retrospective » more Photo by: John Dixon Tim Nugent, left, former director and founder of the UI Rehabilitation-Education Center shares a laugh with friends and well-wishers at a ceremony to unveil street signs in his honor at the Center on Thursday April 19, 2007. A portion of Stadium Drive from Neil Street to First Street was dedicated 'Tim Nugent Way' in honor of Nugent's pioneering work for the physically disabled. Other Related Content U.S. schools chief praises UI disability services

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URBANA — Timothy Nugent, the University of Illinois professor who helped change the world for people with disabilities, died Wednesday morning, according to the UI.

Interim Chancellor Barbara Wilson announced the news at a Board of Trustees' committee meeting in Chicago.

Working first with returning veterans from World War II, Nugent founded the UI Division of Disability Resources and Educational Services in 1948, the first of its kind, and build it into a model for the rest of the world. The UI was the first university to use curb cuts for wheelchairs, the first to have fully accessible bus routes, and the first to provide adaptive sports for students with disabilities.

The UI named its fully accessible residence hall after Nugent in 2010.

"Tim kept pushing the boundaries and realizing the possibilities," Tonya Gallager, dean of the College of Applied Health Sciences, said of him recently.