May Milling Co., Grandview’s oldest business, closes

By Don Bradley

Nothing smells like an old feed store.

Through the front door of May Milling in Grandview, your nose is greeted by nearly a hundred years of molasses, grains and seed, an invisible fog that brings to mind both the abundance of life around us and a time long behind us.

The past hangs so thick inside this old building with its hardwood floor (charmingly warped in places), scattered straw, sleeping cats and original mill wheel, you can almost hear voices.

And now, it’s all ending. On Feb. 26, May Milling, where receipts are still written with a ballpoint pen, closed a final time after 96 years at the western end of Grandview’s downtown strip.

The large tin building, a former hay barn that was equipped with plank flooring and milling machinery sometime after 1940, will go dark and quiet, and another Grandview establishment will become the oldest business in town.

“I hate it for our customers, but the economy was killing us,” said Rod May Jr., the last of a string of family members to run the place which opened in 1930 at 606 Main.

“Will I miss the place? I miss it already.”

A big part of the business was dog, horse and bird feed. Some were made according to the May family recipe. The store also had hay, garden equipment, spices and local honey.

And of course, incubators and egg turners. Seed varieties are displayed at the front counter in old cassette tape cases.

Here’s a curve ball, right in the middle of it all, near the bulk scale, is a music stand holding Arban’s Complete Conservatory Method for Trumpet, first published in 1864.

Looks a little out of place, but then, no, it’s perfect.

In slow moments at the store, Rod gets down the horn that hangs by the old cash register. He’s played in a big band for years.

So, sometimes, it’s him, the cats, the dog in the back (named Boy) and Count Basie. That had to be a treat for the first customer through the door.

Turns out this whole family that’s been mixing feed, sewing sacks and loading seed all these years, plays a musical instrument.

Rod’s dad played in a dance band. His mom plays piano. Brother on the drums. His son has a degree in music.

The May family has been in the grain business since 1898, first in Independence and later stops in Springfield, Mo., and Kansas City’s Dodson and River Market neighborhoods.

 Rod May’s father ran the Grandview location for 33 years until stepping down in 2022. He was still loading 50-pound bags of feed into customers’ cars well into his 90s. He died in 2024.

Rod Jr., the fifth generation of his family to be in the business, is 71, and both his two sons chose different careers.

“The economy is tough and people who used to come in here are now buying online,” he said. “I’m going to retire and nobody wants to run it. So, it’s time.

“The family wasn’t surprised. My mom doesn’t like it, but she understands.”

Since word went out, longtime customers have been coming in as if to pay  respects to a dying friend.

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Debbie Durham came for birdseed. Her mother used to do the same.

“I’m sad, but I understand,” she said. “Times change and now Rod’s getting up there.”

Rod smiled. “She’s the kind of customer that kept us here 90 years.”

After loading bags into her trunk, he watched Debbie drive away.

Then he came back inside where the cats still sleep, dreaming, maybe, in the fog of another time.