Name/Title
May FamilyEntry/Object ID
2023.50.39Scope and Content
[A descendant of the Dutcher family which founded Douglas visited the museum recently and brought additional information about the May family that the Dutcher's oldest daughter, Mary Ann, married into. (In exchange the Society was able to provide her with copies of several early Dutcher May family pictures that were received in a recent donation.) Mary Ann herself never made it to Douglas having died in Chicago before the family came north, but her only living son, William A. May, who billed himself "the original boy of Douglas" made the move with the rest of the Dutchers accompanied by his paternal grandmother. His father, Frederic H. May, was busy with other projects elsewhere, but dropped into the new settlement in 1860 long enough to draw one of the early maps and provide its name, Douglas, after the capital of the Isle of Man where he was born. Below is a brief history of the Mays beginning with Marianne (Hennegan) May, mother of Frederic.]
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Marianne Hennegan was born December 23, 1796, at St. Elizabeth, near Black River on the Island of Jamaica where her father had a large property and many slaves. He died comparatively young in an accident leaving a widow and four daughters. As a young woman Marianne was sent to London for advanced schooling and at the age of 24 was married at Bristol, England, to Edmund May who had been born February 13, 1786, at Gittsham, Devonshire, England. The couple moved to the Island of Guernsey, one of the channel islands near the French Coast and then, at some time prior to 1824, moved to Douglas, the capital city of the Isle of Man in the Irish Sea where Edmund ran a "classical and mathematical academy" on Bath Street. According to a 1969 letter from a researcher there the name May was first recorded on the Isle of Man in 1687 when a Manx woman named Curlett, was married to a man named May from abroad. Edmund and Marianne had one daughter born in England, and three additional daughters, and four sons during the time they resided on the Isle of Man including one named Edmund Charles Moore Curlett May, born in 1824, which might link them to the earlier May family on the Isle of Man. Two of these children later came to Michigan:
Frederic Henry May, born March 22, 1826 at Douglas Julia Jane May, born April 1, 1828 at Douglas
Three children died and were buried at Kirk Onchan on the Isle of Man. The Kirk (or church) Onchan, located in a suburb of Douglas was the site of the marriage of Admiral Bligh of the ill-fated H.M.S. Bounty in the 18th Century.
In 1841, the Mays and their remaining children three sons and two daughters, traveled to America and lived for several months in Brooklyn, New York, before moving to Pike County, Pennsylvania, where they prepared to open a country store at the tiny settlement of Quicktown, three miles from Milford, the county seat. However the large stock of goods they had gathered for the store was destroyed by fire before it opened. They then moved on to the Delaware River at the mouth of the Lackawaxen River where their second son was married to Mary Ann Dutcher, daughter of William F. and Lucinda Dutcher in 1848.
Frederic's father, Edmund May, became associated with a female seminary at Ellicott's Mills, Maryland, and afterwards resided in Lynchburg, Virginia and then Norfolk. The oldest May son had died at Lackawaxen, and two siblings died of consumption at Lynchburg in 1 850 and 1851. The father, Edmund May, died November 3, 1853, at Norfolk, Virginia.
Edmund's widow joined Frederic either before the Dutcher family left Pennsylvania in 1853 or after their arrival in Chicago. William Augustus May, was born to Frederic and Mary Ann in 1851 in Pennsylvania. Two additional children were born in Chicago and on October 16, 1854, seven days after the birth of her third child, Mary Ann died. She and both of the Chicago-born children are buried at Oak Wood Cemetery, Chicago.
When the Dutcher family moved to Michigan in 1855 they were a party of 13. At the head of the family were William F. and Lucinda Dutcher with their son George N. and his wife Eliza, son Thomas Benton, a daughter, Elizabeth (who would later become the wife of Captain Lewis Upson, and Lucinda's brother, Martin Dietrich, and his wife, and their twins, Emma and Emmett; and the toddler William A. May and his grandmother, Mrs. Marianne May. Frederic came to Michigan about the same time but rapidly became involved in railroad building and spent little time in Douglas. The 1860 Allegan County census shows Mary A. May, aged 63, born Isle of Jamaica and nine-year-old William A., in the household of William and Lucinda Dutcher in Newark (later Saugatuck) Township. As a young man in Pennsylvania Frederic May had done the first survey for the Erie Railroad. At the start of the Civil War he went to Southern Illinois and Missouri and worked toward the completion of the North Missouri Railway much needed as a supply line by the Union Army. In later years he was given the courtesy title of "Colonel" and was often spoken of as a war hero although he had no military record. This mystery was never explained in Michigan newspapers, but his New Jersey obituary tells the story this way:
"During the War of Rebellion he was active in aiding the Government transportation of troops and in keeping the railroads open when menaced by rebel guerrillas. Once when ordered by "bushwhackers" to pull down the American flag in a railroad camp, he refused, and the leader, pulling a pistol, gave him five minutes to decide. Every half minute the guerrilla called time, but when four and one-half minutes had expired a man who supplied the railroad camp with meat (he was also a friend of the leader of the "bushwhackers") arrived out of breath and persuaded the leader to spare Mr. May, as his meat account for that week had not been settled!"
After the war May returned to Allegan County where he was one of the investors behind the riverboat Ira Chaffee, built at Allegan in 1867. Edward Costain, another investor and its captain for many years was also from the Isle of Man. The Chaffee was the first locally owned steamboat to make regular trips between Saugatuck and Chicago. In 1869 May became manager of the Allegan and Holland Railroad which immediately consolidated with the Muskegon and Ferrysburg to form the Michigan Lake Shore Railroad Company. It was later acquired by the Grand Haven Railroad which retained May as manager. He severed his connection with the railroad in 1881 after it became part of the Chicago & West Michigan.
A small watering station in northern Fillmore Township, Allegan County, the last station before trains reached the City of Holland, was named for him. May Station was originally located on 146th Avenue where the Michigan Lake Shore Railroad tracks crossed a branch of the Black River. Later a general store was opened nearby and September 25, 1895, a post office called May was established there. The post office closed in 1902. All remnants of May have now disappeared in the building of the Holland Industrial Park.
Frederic May was married for a second time, before 1862 to Rachel M. Torode of Chicago and had five additional children. For much of the 1880s and 1890s May was owner of the Chaffee House in Allegan where his mother died in 1879. At the time of her death she was survived by her son Frederic and one daughter, probably Julia Jane, who was then living in Grand Rapids.
About 1882 Frederic and his family moved to New Jersey, first Caldwell, then Newark, and finally Roseville where he died May 10, 1908. He was president and manager of the American Rapid Telegraph Company and had many business interests on the side including a mine in Utah.
William F. Dutcher, died in 1863, and all of his estate, including the Douglas village plat passed on to his heirs including William May, as heir to his mother Mary Ann. Because he was still a minor a guardian had to be appointed and these proceedings are included in most land abstracts of property that was part of the original village of Douglas.
The source of the name Douglas, has sparked discussion for more than a century. The official explanation is that the town was named by Frederic H. May to honor his birthplace, Douglas, on the Isle of Man where the Dhoo ("dark" in Manx) and Glass ("gray"in Manx) rivers meet. However, most of the Dutcher men were avid Democrats and supported Stephen A. Douglas, the presidential candidate of 1 860 so there was common talk that the town was named for him. William A. May refutes this story, with some fervor, in a 1910 article in an Allegan newspaper:
"Mr. May was in politics a rabid Republican and having the right to name the town would never have consented to call it after the Democratic nominee. Party feeling ran too high in those days for such a thing to be possible."
But the name was probably embraced with some enthusiasm by the Democratic Dutchers for that reason.
William A. May moved to Allegan with his father and step-mother but returned to Douglas in 1871 to marry Joanna Priscilla "Josie" Riley, the daughter of Thomas A. and Fidelia Gleason Adelaide (Bowman) Riley. Josie's younger sister, Mary Alice, later married Jesse Hutchinson and was the grandmother of J. Edward Hutchinson of Fennville who served in several political offices and from 1961 to 1976 was a member of the U. S. House of Representatives. Thomas Riley died in the Civil War and Fidelia took for her second husband Union veteran Anthony Slack. They had one daughter, Blanche, who was later married to Great Lakes Captain Claude Ellis.
William and Josie were married at the family home in Douglas that still stands. The Riley/Slack/Ellis home is located behind the bowling alley on what is now known as Ellis Street. Elijah Mix Jr. was best man at the wedding and gifted the couple with a candlestick that had belonged to his father General Elijah Mix who had assisted in the capture of Jefferson Davis in the closing days of the Civil War. The brass candlestick was said to be the one that held a candle on the table in the tent to which Davis was brought before the Union officers.
William and Josie May were in and out of Douglas for several years after their marriage, two of their five children were born in the village. For several years William was a traveling auditor for the Canada Southern Railroad and later worked for the press bureau of the American Rapid Telegraph Co. which his father managed. 4n the side he followed a theological course of study and in 1920 was ordained into the Baptist ministry. He was also a prolific song writer and composed more than 1,000 hymns and many popular songs.
About 1920 the William Mays moved back to Douglas for a year and lived at the Dutcher home down by the river where the 70-year old man astounded relatives by going skating on the frozen river before breakfast on winter mornings. The Dutcher home was located in a grove of trees across Washington Street from the Douglas Basket Factory. A small story and a half cottage erected by Jonathan Wade prior to 1855 had formed the nucleus of a residence expanded by a long, low addition. The structure eventually evolved into a two-story colonial front house that continued as a home until 1989 when it was razed by the Community Church in anticipation of a new parking lot which was never completed.
Leaving Douglas about 1922 the Mays lived in Allegan for a while before returning to New Jersey where William died March 25, 1935, as he and Josie were making plans to return to Douglas and spend their declining years with her half -sister, Blanche (Slack) Ellis. Josie died in 1936. William and Josie and two sons, Frederic W., who died in 1933, and David E., who died in 1929, are buried in the Douglas Cemetery.
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[In addition to the May family, and Captain Captain there are at least two other area families from the Isle of Man. The Corlett family which first began visiting the Douglas lakeshore in 1901 may be distantly related to the Mays. They have owned several houses along the Douglas lakeshore including one called "Ballakeyll" which means "five acre farm" in Moat. More recently William Manifold Sr., a native of Man, settled in Saugatuck township.]
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To My Wife WHEN DAY IS DONE
I sometimes have a vision when the whirl of day is past,
That will be in my dreaming as long as dreamings last,
For it brings to me a thrilling joy, an hour of mem'ries caught
From golden moments, as they pass with untold riches wrought.
I see a winding river whose rippling currents flow
By wooded slopes and yellow hills, to sandy beach below,
Passing a quiet village town, of houses trim and neat,
Where maple trees with rustling leaves, make music low and sweet.
I see the "big gate" swinging where the wide street meets the lane;
Walk beneath the fruit trees branching o'er the pathway clear and
Up to a little cottage, with its wide-board whitewood floor, plain
And a tall and spreading rose bush growing by the kitchen door.
I hear the Great Lake singing as it strikes its pebbled strand
When I pause a moment to gaze upon that favored land,
Then turn to find a welcome from one with beaming face,
Whose loved and loving presence I hold in swift embrace.
I see the nodding lilacs along the orchard walk
Where young folks used to wander for a little pleasant talk,
And I hear the night-birds calling in the silent twilight hours,
Feel the breeze my forehead touching; smell the perfume of the flowers.
The vision then begins to fade -- but once more I see the room
Where others looked one summer day on happy bride and groom**
And then it slowly disappears -- for Fate and Fancy hold
Some things that dreams, with all their power, cannot to us unfold.
* On her 78th birthday
** Married July 2nd, 1871
[This poem was written by William A. May in 1930 in celebration of the 78th birthday of his wife, Josie (Riley) May. The portion reprinted here contains an interesting description of early Douglas, especially the young man's path from his house by the "winding river" to her house "where the wide street meets the lane" on the outskirts of the settlement. Note several references to fruit trees and orchards that are growing within the village.]Collection
SDHS NL Inserts, Family History, 1830 Settlement, pioneer eraCataloged By
Winthers, SallyAcquisition
Accession
2023.50Acquisition Method
Found in CollectionNotes
SDHS Newsletter insert pages81-84Location
* Untyped Location
Digital data in CatalogItRelationships
Related Person or Organization
Person or Organization
May, Frederic Henry, Dutcher, William Fuller 1800-1861, Dutcher family, Ira Chaffee (ship) 1867, Hutchinson, J. Edward 1914-1985, May, William Augustus 1850-1935General Notes
Note
This information was OCR text scanned from SDHS newsletter supplements. A binder of original paper copies is catalog item 2023.50.01Note
Everyday Life in May, Michigan from SDHS newsletter insert, page 97
[In a recent newsletter we wrote about the May family, early settlers in Douglas, and the settlement of .May north of Saugatuck that was named for Frederick H. May, the man who named Douglas and was later involved with several railroads in Allegan County. May was an early watering stop for the railroad and from 1895 to 1902 had its own post office. Tire following letter was received from Esther Defouw who grew up in May, and has some interesting stories about life as a small town shopkeeper.]
I am very interested in the history of May, Michigan. My father bought the grocery store there in 1930. He had the store and peddle wagon for many years. I think he closed it in 1953. On November 1 l, 1940, a wind storm took the roof off the old buck house and they rebuilt the house on the same foundation and it is still there, the store was taken down in the 1970s. My son still lives there on 52nd Street. I lived there till 1948, when I was married and now live just around the corner to the west on 147th Avenue, also called Fourteenth Street.
In 1953 my parents made the old store into an apartment for my brother who was attending seminary at Calvin College in Grand Rapids. After he graduated he moved away and became a chaplain in the Navy. My father died in 1966, my mother in 1974.
It was a very difficult life when we had the store. They didn't have electricity, had a gas lamp in the store that had a cloth mantle. In the house we had kerosene lamps. There was a coal stove in the middle of the store. Father started his peddle wagon with a team of horses, later he had trucks. He went on a different route every day. He stopped at all the farm houses and they traded eggs for groceries. On his truck he had the sign:
GERRlT ROOM GROCERY
No Long Waits and No Short Weights
May, Mich.
They had everything in bulk so every evening they had to weigh everything. I put in 5# and 10# or smaller bags: sugar, brown sugar, rice, oatmeal, even tea and coconut (they were just in the small bags). They didn't have heaters in the truck so he had a small kerosene stove to keep the groceries from freezing. Just chains on the tires as the roads were plowed very often then. Mother made little cloth bags and put salt in them to use on the windshield to keep the frost off. My brothers and sisters often talk about May, Mich. We wish we knew more about it.
Written by Esther DefouwCreate Date
November 9, 2023Update Date
January 7, 2024
