Jane Price Prager, MD

Jane Price Prager, MD, of Waban and Wellfleet, MA died on November 5, 2022 at the age of 95 from complications of Parkinson’s Disease.  Beloved by her family, she leaves her daughter Laura, her husband Frederick Millham and their children Samuel and Lucia; daughter Sarah, her husband Steven Smith and their children Benjamin, Jessica, and Nathan; daughter Margaret, her husband, William Paine and their children David and Susannah; cousin Audrey Escoll; first cousins once removed Adam, Jason, and Amy Brener, and niece Eve Zachary Mykytyn.  Her husband of 56 years, Alan S. Prager, MD, died in 2013.

Born and raised in New Jersey and Florida, she moved to Boston, MA to attend Boston University School of Education and then Boston University School of Medicine, from which she graduated in 1954.  Dr. Prager was a woman of great integrity and insight; she was also a pioneer. From a young age, she knew she wanted to have a family and to pursue a career in medicine at a time when few women did both.  Following graduation from medical school, she served as an editor of the first edition of Dr. Stanley Robbin’s textbook of pathology, The Pathologic Basis of Disease, the standard text for medical students and residents for at least half a century. She then completed a pediatric internship at Boston City Hospital and an adult psychiatry residency at Boston State Hospital, where she met her husband.  After finishing her residency, she had three daughters and stayed home with them for several years.  However, determined to become a child psychiatrist, in 1962 she applied to what was then the Radcliffe Institute for Independent Studies and was awarded a Bunting Fellowship not once, but twice, which paid a stipend to cover the childcare she needed so that she could finish her training.  She maintained an active private practice in adult and child psychiatry for half a century.

Dr. Prager had a natural sense of style and loved beautiful things, particularly jewelry.  At 75, she became a GIA-certified gemologist.  Having been denied a Bat Mitzvah at 13 because of the rules in her family’s synagogue, she studied Hebrew as an adult and became a Bat Mitzvah at age 80.  Despite all her accomplishments, personal and professional, she found the most joy in her family, particularly the times she shared with her children and grandchildren on the beaches of Wellfleet.  Services will be held at Temple Israel, 477 Longwood Ave, Boston, MA (parking on the Riverway), November 10, 2022 at 10 am. Memorial Observance will be held at the home of Laura Prager and Frederick Millham. Donations in Dr. Jane Prager’s honor may be made to Massachusetts Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Children at 125 Hartwell Avenue Lexington, MA 02421, mspcc.org/donate.