Wandering around the Strong Cemetery on a late August day, you might come across a monument erected to the memory of Sara May “by loving pupils of the May School.”

The 10-foot-high white marble marker is as stately now as the day it was placed over her gravesite, and the engraving is as easy to read as the day her former pupil, John Soule, first carved the words of tribute.

Sara was born in Strong in 1835 to family who stressed education. She and her sister Julia were good students, and Sara went on to train as a teacher at Mt. Holyoke Seminary.

She taught in public schools in Strong and Winthrop and then headed west to join her sister in Kentucky. But Sara’s health was poor, and after a few years the sisters returned to Maine. When she felt well enough again, the sisters decided to open a private school of their own in Farmington. In 1868, they established the May School for Girls, offering instruction in Latin, French and high mathematics.

“She seemed to be possessed of a happy faculty of gaining the love of her pupils and interesting them in everything good, whether of a literary, moral or religious character,” recalled one of Sara’s pupils years later.

The women’s institution was immediately successful. With no public high school in town, it filled a need for a college preparatory curriculum, and soon many families wanted to send their sons as well as daughters. The sisters expanded and renamed their school the Wendell Institute. It remained small; only the wealthier families could afford to educate their children beyond the eighth grade.

Forty-five students graduated from the school during its 13 years of existence in Farmington. Many alumni went on to prestigious colleges such as Vassar, Wellesley, Bowdoin and Bates.

In 1877, the town of Farmington established a public high school, and the May sisters’ private school began to lose patrons. In 1881, the sisters moved their institution to their hometown of Strong. Seven years later, Sara died at the age of 53. She was buried in the Strong Cemetery, initially beneath a modest granite marker. But by then, some of her students had returned to Farmington to raise families and pursue careers. Among them were attorneys Arthur Belcher and Elmer Richards. In 1892, they decided to honor their former teacher with a monument to her efforts and sent out a fund-raising letter.

“From all over the country came the responses with contributions larger or smaller,” remembered an organizer, “and almost always an added spontaneous word of love for Miss Sara.'”

Luann Yetter teaches writing at the University of Maine at Farmington. She can be reached at [email protected].