Mrs. May Preston Slosson Dies After Heart Attack

Mrs. May Preston Slosson Dies After Heart Attack
Mrs. May Preston Slosson, 85 years old, mother of Prof. Preston W. Slosson, and the first woman to receive a Ph.D. in this country, died this morning at the Slosson home at 2101 Devonshire Rd., following a heart attack on Monday.
Born in Ilion, N. Y., on Sept. 10, 1858, the daughter of Mary Gorsline Preston and Rev. Levi C. Preston, while still a small girl she moved to Kansas where she was among the first generation of white children to grow up in Kansas. Her father who was a Baptist minister, held pastorates in Kansas and Michigan, and Mrs. Slosson was educated at Hillsdale College, graduating in 1878. She has been one of the college's oldest living graduates, and was granted a Ph.D. from Cornell in 1880. The degree was granted in the field of philosophy, and Mrs. Slosson's doctoral thesis was written on "Different Theories of Beauty."
Taught At Hillsdale
Following her graduation, she taught Greek and philosophy at Hastings College, Hastings, Neb., until the time of her marriage to Dr. Edwin E. Slosson, a graduate of the University of Kansas. Dr. Slosson died 14 years ago.
Following their marriage, Dr. and Mrs. Slosson went to the University of Wyoming at Laramie, Wyo., where Dr. Slosson served as a professor of chemistry until 1903. While in Wyoming, Mrs. Slosson served as chaplain of the state penitentiary, and is believed to be the only woman ever to have held such a post. At the time the Slossons arrived in Wyoming, the state had been in the Union for only one year, and the University was still in the process of organization. The Slossons had two sons, Preston William, born in 1892, now a professor of history at the University, and Raymond Alfred, born in 1894, who died six years later.
The family moved to New York City in 1903, where Dr. Slosson was literary editor of the New York Independent, a weekly magazine. Mrs. Slosson was active in the suffragette movement. In 1920 they moved to Washington D.C., and there Dr. Slosson worked as director of Science Service, a scientific news agency. Dr. and Mrs. Slosson made their home there until Dr. Slosson's death in October, 1929, when Mrs. Slosson came to Ann Arbor to live with the Preston Slossons.
In Many Organizations
Mrs. Slosson was a member of the Congregation church in New York, Washington and Ann Arbor, and was also a member of International Sorosis, the Faculty Women's Club, the Meridian Club in New York, the Colony of New England Women's Society and the Save The Children Federation. The AAUW has maintained a scholarship in her name at the University of Michigan for some years, and Mrs. Slosson had in turn, maintained a scholarship for 14 years at the University of Kansas, in the name of her husband.
She had also been an active member of the Dunbar Community Center, and had frequently attended both the Second Baptist church and the Bethel AME church, maintaining a deep interest in both organizations. Since the outbreak of the war she had adopted an English child in Britain, through the foster-parent association, and had been an active member of the Santa Claus club of the Save the Children Federation.
Wrote Book Of Poems
She was also known as the author of a book of poems, "From A Quiet Garden," published while she was living in New York.
She is survived by her son and daughter-in-law, the latter the former Lucy Dennis Wright, daughter of Bishop Collins Denny of Richmond, Va., and by four grandchildren, Lucy Chase Wright, Mary Elizabeth Wright, Flora May Slosson and Edith Denny Slosson. Other relatives include a cousin, Miss Elizabeth Flagg of Kansas City, Kas., and a sister-in-law, Mrs. Bryant Preston of Palo Alto, Calif.
Funeral services will be held at 3 o'clock Sunday afternoon at the First Congregational church, with Dr. Leonard A. Parr officiating. The body will be cremated and the ashes will be taken to Laramie, Wyo., for burial. Friends may call at the Slosson home until noon Sunday.