31.153.3

Henry May, who came to Ames in 1866 with his wife Ellen, was first teacher to work for the Ames school district. During the Civil War, May served in the U.S. State Department in Africa where he contracted malaria. His illness and subsequent drug addiction caused his early retirement from government services. Beginning in 1867, May taught in the one-room Hoggatt School (which was a subdistrict school, built in 1861) for three terms in the employ of Washington and Grant townships. When the new town of Ames built its first official school, a two-story, two-room frame structure near the site of the present (1991) Lincoln Building, May continued to teach there. After retiring from teaching, May became first rural mail carrier for Ames.