Roberta Lee Grover May was born in Eric, Oklahoma December 30, 1912 to Vernon Richardson and Ollie Mae Grover. She passed away July 11, 2017 at the age of 104 years, 6 months and 12 days.
She grew up on a farm in Sweetwater, Oklahoma. She chopped and picked cotton, milked cows, and cultivated cotton with a one horse cultivator at a very young age. She met an Alabama man who was working a farm next to her family farm and they later married in 1934. His name was James Garland May. They moved back to his home in Waterloo, Alabama and made their home there until his death in 1977. After Garland’s death she moved to Texas to live with her daughter Karon. She also lived with her daughters Judy and Patsy at different times. She came back to Alabama to live with her son James “Jim” May and his wife Barbara in July of 2006 and lived with them until her death. Her daughter Wanda Sue, moved from Texas to Alabama in 2010 to help Jim and Barbara take care of her.
Roberta was a wonderful mother and always looked for the best in everyone. She was an accomplished artist and was at one time a member of the Alabama Art Association. She has displayed her paintings at the Helen Keller Festival in years past. She painted a 4 X 8 foot painting of the church baptistery at Waterloo Church of Christ in 1971, and it hangs there to this day. He paintings are hung on the walls of relatives and friends all over the United States. She stopped painting at the age of 94. She has seen many changes in her lifetime. One of her earliest memories was as a small child, traveling in a covered wagon from Oklahoma to Colorado. She told of lying in her bed-roll at night on the trail and listening to the horses munch grass and to the jingle of the hobbles as the team grazed by the trail. A few years later she remembered riding in a passenger train that had kerosene lamps. In later years she traveled from Texas to New York and Oregon in a jumbo jet. She also played the piano and sang alto with her daughters. She enjoyed gardening, sewing, and crocheting. She became a member of Waterloo Church of Christ in 1942, when she was baptized into Christ. All of her children are faithful Christians.
Roberta was preceded in death by her husband James Garland May; son Raphiel; sisters, Melvina Stone and Velma Barnett; brothers; Louis, Richard, and Rodney Grover.
Survivors include her daughters; Patsy Pounder (Ed), and Wanda Sue Spalding of Waterloo; Karon Coffey, Lubbock, Texas, and Judy Browneski (Tom) of Hauppauge, New York; son, James May (Barbara) of Waterloo, Alabama; sister, Colleen Tharp of Ft. Worth, Texas, 15 grandchildren, 33 great grand children, and 37 great great grandchildren.
The visitation will be Saturday, July 15th from 11 to 12:00 p.m. at Waterloo Church of Christ. The funeral will follow at 12:00 p.m. David Rushlow will be officiating. Burial will follow at Richardson Cemetery.
Pallbearers will be Dwayne May, Dennis Spalding, Kevin Turnage, Barry Turnage, Tyler May, and Taylor May.
