Joseph Ray was born on November 25, 1807, in Ohio County, Virginia. He attended local schools and quickly proved himself to be an adept student. By the time he was sixteen, he had begun a career as a teacher. In 1825, Ray enrolled in Franklin College in New Athens, Ohio. While a student at Franklin College, Ray studied medicine under Joel Martin. Upon graduating from college in 1828, Ray enrolled in the Medical College of Ohio, located in Cincinnati. During the winter he attended college, and during the summers, he taught school. He graduated in 1831.

Ray is most famous for authoring mathematical textbooks. By the end of the nineteenth century, Ray's texts had become the most widely used math books in the United States, with sales approaching 120 million copies. For a time, they were the most used textbooks across all disciplines. William McGuffey, a colleague of Ray's at Woodward College, eventually produced a series of English readers.

Ray was a member of the Ohio State Teachers Association and served as that organization's president in 1853. In 1854, he became an associate editor for The Ohio Journal of Education. He died on April 11, 1855, from tuberculosis.

約瑟夫·雷伊教授於1807年齣生於美國弗吉尼亞俄亥俄縣，小時在地方學校接受教育，學業優秀。16歲時，他就開始步入其教師生涯，1825年到富蘭剋林學院求學，跟隨喬爾·馬丁教授學習醫學。1828年畢業後進入俄亥俄醫學院學習，1831年畢業。大學畢業後，他在辛辛那提的伍德沃德中學找瞭份當教師的工作，開始教數學。1836年，俄亥俄司法當局準許伍德沃德中學由高中升格為辛辛那提伍德學院，雷伊成為該學院的一名教授。1851年，該校以變為一所公立高中，雷伊一直在此擔任校長，直至去世。

雷伊最傑齣的貢獻是他編寫的係列數學教材，並以此聞名。這套數學課本與他在伍德學院的同事麥加菲編寫的《美國語文讀本》，一同被作為美國學校的語文和數學教材，近50年內，美國上萬學校使用這兩套教材，纍計銷量均超過1.22億冊，對美國教育産生瞭極大影響。

雷伊教授對俄亥俄州的教師職業培訓也發揮瞭很大作用，他幫助建立西部文化中心與職業教師學院，將好的教學技術與經驗傳授給老師。他加入俄亥俄州教師協會成員，並於1853年任其會長，此外還擔任《俄亥俄教育》雜誌社的副總編。

《美國小學數學(第4冊)》內容簡介：We are honored and happy to bring this classic Arithmetic by Joseph Ray. These popular books sold more than any other arithmetic in America, in fact over 120 million copies and are still used in modern American schools and families. As you can see, this set of Arithmetic textbooks is organized in an orderly manner around the discipline of arithmetic itself.

Ray emphasized critical thinking in his classroom. He believed that his students needed to learn how to apply what they learned to real-life situations. Rather than giving his pupils simple problems to solve, he preferred word problems. Students can increase their reading comprehension skills, and learn to think.This book includes philosophical understandings; principles and properties of numbers; and advanced study of common and decimal fractions, measurements, ratio, proportion, percentage, powers and roots, series, business math, and geometry. It has challenging work for advanced students and basic work for slower students and can be used for grades 7 and 8, as well as for high school.