May French Sheldon (1847–1936) was a publisher, author and explorer.
May French was born May 10, 1847, at Bridgewater, Pennsylvania. Her father was Joseph French, the civil engineer, and her mother Elizabeth J. French (née Poorman). She was educated in America and overseas, studying art and developing into an author and ethnologist. She married an American, Eli Lemon Sheldon, a banker, in 1876 and they moved to London where they established publishing firms.
Mrs French Sheldon is noted as a translator of Flaubert's Salammbô, and author of papers and essays, but acquired fame for an expedition. In 1891 she left London for Africa, unaccompanied, seeking assistance amongst the African peoples as she explored around Lake Chala. She returned with ethnographic materials, wrote on her experience, and undertook a lecture tour. French Sheldon received multiple awards for her exhibition at the World's Columbian Exposition, and was appointed membership in societies such as the Writer's Club and the Anthropological Society of Washington. She was made a fellow of the Royal Geographical Society,[1] among the first 15 women to receive this honour, in November 1892.[2]