Robert Wills Mays
Birth:  September 1, 1854, Bastrop County, Texas, USA
Death: February 22, 1921, Texas, USA

Robert Wills Mays was born September 1, 1854 to Thomas H. and Arie (Ellis) Mays in Bastrop County, Texas. His father, Thomas H. Mays, entered Texas through "Austin's Little Colony" and fought and was wounded in the Battle of San Jacinto. Arie Ellis was  born 1818, Kentucky.  She moved to Texas where she married Robert Wills Mays.  Arie Ellis Mays died May 21, 1890, Denison, Grayson County, Texas, and is buried in Oakwood Cemetery, nDe

Thomas and Arie had 9 children:
Emily (1838 - 1873)
Mary Ann (1840 - bef 1870)
Thomas Frank (Apr 5, 1843 - September 4, 1922)
Octavia (July 27, 1845  - March 28, 1887)
Samuel J. (February 10. 1848 - August 22, 1887)
Charles W. (1851 - ? )
Robert Wills (September 1, 1854 - February 22. 1921)
Preston C. (1857 - ?)
Louis Hill (June 1861 - ?)

Robert W. had 4 children from his marriage to Sophronia Gurley:
Mollie Edna ( December 2, 1873 - January 15, 1924)
Henry Walton (December 1, 1877 - May 13, 1917)
Laura Frances (November  3, 1878 - 1 February 1, 1880)
Arie "Willa" (6 September 6, 1881 - July 19, 1977)

After his wife's death, he married Jennie Louise Sherrill.  Jennie was born in Pulaski, Tennessee on December 28, 1868. She married Robert Wills Mays on  December 18, 1884 in Roanoke, Denton County, Texas. 

The couple had two children:
Robert S. (March 31, 1888 - December 11, 1961)
Bessie E. (February 19, 1894 - February 15, 1972)

Jennie died in her home in Denison on July 21, 1943, and is buried at Fairview Cemetery with her husband, son, daughter-in-law, and grandson.  Find-A-Grave

Robert was a passenger engineer on KATY Railroad for over 40 years and was killed in a derailment at Powers, Texas.
Find-A-Grave

Children:

Mollie Edna Mays Henson (1873 - 1924)*

Arie Mays Hendrick (1881 - 1977)*

Robert Sherrill Mays (1888 - 1961)*

 

Siblings:

Octavia Mays Smith (1845 - 1887)*

Samuel J. Mays (1848 - 1887)*

Robert Wills Mays (1854 - 1921)

Burial: Fairview Cemetery, Denison, Grayson County, Texas, USA
Plot: Section 26

HIS MOTHER:

Arie Ellis Mays (1818 - 1890)

Arie died in Denison and is buried at Oakwood Cemetery with her daughter, Ocatvia Smith, and son, Samuel J.

Wraparound porches, slanted outward to shed water, obscure the unusual shape of this home. Before air-conditioning, porches were a prized amenity. Today it is hard to see the house for the overgrown shrubbery.

According to Jim Sears:
Built in the mid-1890s, the "steamboat" style house at 700 West Texas Street was home for more than half a century to the family of Robert Wills Mays (1854-1921) and Jennie Sherrill Mays (1863-1943). Robert was a Katy engineer whose father, Thomas H. Mays, came to Texas with Stephen F. Austin's "Little Colony" and was later wounded in the Battle of San Jacinto. Robert died in a train derailment at the age of 66.