The Quiet May Oil Burner and the Rise of Automatic Heating

Quiet May was a brand name used by the May Oil Burner Corporation (1885-1948) of Baltimore, Maryland, a company active during the early growth of residential oil heating in the 1920s. Founded during the coal-dominated heating era, the company entered the market as oil burners began gaining acceptance as a cleaner, more convenient alternative to hand-fired coal furnaces. By the mid-1920s, May Oil Burner Corporation was producing automatic oil burner equipment designed to retrofit existing heating systems, reducing labor and improving temperature control for homeowners. Installation manuals from the late 1920s show that Quiet May burners were already being marketed as modern, efficient, and “automatic.”¹

During the late 1920s and early 1930s, Quiet May expanded through industry catalogs, trade publications, and dealer networks in major U.S. cities, and even had international representation. Catalogs from the era depict a range of burner sizes suitable for homes to large buildings; the company trained mechanics and emphasized reliability and service as part of its brand.²

By the late 1930s, Quiet May’s visual branding evolved alongside residential heating design, including a distinctive badge with a design patent issued in 1939. This decorative nameplate appeared on furnaces and helped reinforce the modern, refined character of oil heating equipment during a period of rapid adoption across the United States.³

Fig. A shows the design of the era with a patent labelled “D117,291” inscribed on it. Fig. B shows a sketch of the drawings of the original equipment from the original Quiet May Oil Burner Service Manual.

Fig. C is a picture from the original 1929 Brochure that outlined the company’s founding’s. Fig. D is reference to the original service manual that Fig. B image is found inside.

Like many regional oil burner makers, Quiet May’s prominence declined in the post-World War II era as larger national brands absorbed distribution channels and standardized products. Although precise records of the company’s later years are sparse, existing manuals, catalogs, advertisements, and badges preserve Quiet May’s role in the early development of automatic residential heating systems.⁴

Historical Sources

¹ Sweet’s Catalog, Vol. D0014 (New York: F. W. Dodge Corporation, 1931), listing for May Oil Burner Corporation, “Quiet May Automatic Oil Burner,” accessed via Internet Archive, https://archive.org/details/SweetsCatalog1931Vol.D0014.

² United States Patent Office, U.S. Design Patent D117,291, issued November 7, 1939, assigned to May Oil Burner Corporation, accessed via Google Patents, https://patents.google.com/patent/USD117291.

³ Dan Holohan, “Quiet May,” Dead Men Tales, HeatingHelp.com, accessed February 15, 2026, https://heatinghelp.com/news-and-media/dead-men-tales/quiet-may/.

⁴ Instructions for the Installation and Service of the Quiet May Automatic Oil Burner (Baltimore, MD: May Oil Burner Corporation, c. 1927).