Logan County, West Virginia          Biography of John F. MAY, M.D.- Logan Co.

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History of West Virginia, Old and New
Published 1923, The American Historical Society, Inc.
Chicago & New York, Volume 111
Page 370


     John F. May M.D.  All the years of his active life Doctor May has
been identified with some work that has a vital part in the welfare of
his community. He was a teacher for many years, later took up and
studied medicine, and after practicing some years in his native state of
Kentucky moved to West Virginia, and has been one of the leading mine
physicians of Logan County. His present location is at Rossmore in that
county, on the Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad branch from Logan to Omar.
     He was born in Johnson County, Kentucky, September 9, 1869. His
family established themselves in the Big Sandy Valley in Eastern
Kentucky more than a century ago. His great-grandfather left old
Virginia in 1810, and while coming down the Big Sandy found at the mouth
of Middle Creek what seemed to him an ideal place for a home with
abundance of game to supply him with food. He took up his claim there,
and lived in that locality until his death. The grandfather of Doctor
May was prominent in politics and a power in that community. He died in
1855. Doctor May is a son of Thomas Green and Martha (Rice) May, both
natives of Kentucky. His father was a farmer and stock man, was a deacon
in the Baptist Church and a member of the Masonic Order. He had a
brother in the civil war.
     John F. May attended common schools in Johnson Co., also the
Baptist Seminary, known as the Enterprise High School, and soon
afterward began his work as a school teacher, a vocation he followed for
seventeen years. While teaching he pursued normal cources, and finally,
in 1902, he took up the study of medicine in the University of Kentucky
at Louisville, where he graduated M.D. in 1905. During the following
five years Doctor May practiced in Boyd Co., Kentucky, at Princess Post
Office. Since then his professional work has been in Logan Co., West
Virginia. For eight years he practiced at Ethel and in the City of
Logan, and for two years was associated with Doctor Farley at Holden.
Since December, 1921, he has been located at Rossmore as physician for
the Logan Mining Company and the Switizer Coal Company.
     In 1891, at Flat Gap, Kentucky, Doctor May married Miss Charlotte
Seagraves, daughter of E. G. and Sarah (Gray) Seagraves, her father a
native of Kentucky and her mother of Tennessee. E.G. Seagraves for
twenty years was a school teacher and was also a farmer and merchant.
Doctor and Mrs. May have one child, Grace May, now Mrs. Lucian Adkins.
She and her two children, Frank and Charles reside with Doctor May.
Doctor May is a Baptist, is a Scottish Rite Mason and Shriner and a
republican.