Russell H. Mays, 54, of 810 North street, suffered a fatal heart attack while driving his car late Saturday morning on his mail route north of town. Mr. Mays, a rural mail carrier, was pronounced dead upon arrrival at Good Samaritan Hospital.

After he was stricken, Mr. Mays was able to stop the car before it was wrecked. He was driving on a rural road about six miles north of town, east of state highway 37. Besides serving as a mail carrier, Mr. Mays was a talented painter. He painted murals for 20 churches in southern Illinois.

Funeral services will be held at 2:00 p.m. Tuesday at Myers Chapel. The Rev. A.B. Clodfelter will officiate and burial will be in Memorial Gardens. The body will lie in state at Myers Chapel, where friends may call after 4:00 p.m. today.

Mr. Mays was born December 25, 1914 at Scheller, the son of Rufus and Nola (Newbury) Mays.

On March 24, 1940 he was married, in Mt. Vernon, to Olive Lively, who survives.

Mr. Mays was a member of the Wesley Methodist church, the United Methodist Men's Fellowship at Wesley, and the Rural Letter Carriers Association.

Besides his wife, he is survived by his father, Rufus Mays and his step mother, Anna Thompson Mays, of Mt. Vernon; one son Russell Wayne Mays at home; three daughters Mrs. Ellen Diane Clifton of Louisville, Ill., Mrs. Linda Joyce Robinson of Mt. Vernon, and Elaine Marie Mays at home; three brothers, Verner and Robert Mays of Mt. Vernon and Burrell Mays of Minooka, Ill.; three sisters, Mrs. Margaret Niekrenz and Mrs. Gladys Shurtz of Mt. Vernon and Mrs. Violet Hall of Mission, Texas; three grandchildren; three step-brothers, Loren Thompson of Marion, Lee Thompson of Plymouth, Ind., and Bill Thompson of Wheeling, Ill.; and two step-sisters, Mrs. Maxine Parks of Marion and Mrs. Ethel Woeltjen of Highland Park, Ill.

Source: Mt. Vernon Register News
Date: July 1969
Submitted by: Rosemary Newell Atkins