May Baird

Lady Matilda (May) Deans Baird CBE (née Tennent, 14 May 1901− 16 August 1983) was a Scottish doctor and social pioneer. She was a town councillor in Aberdeen and was the first woman to hold the position of Chair of a regional hospital board.

Baird was born in Larkhall on 14 May 1901. She was educated at a local school before going on to the Glasgow High School for Girls. She studied science and medicine at the University of Glasgow, graduating with a BSc in 1922 and an MB ChB in 1924.

After leaving university she worked as a junior doctor in Glasgow hospitals. In 1928 she married Dugald Baird, the gynaecologist and obstetrician. She and her husband moved to Aberdeen in 1936. Her desire to reduce the hardships experienced by the poor and neglected led her being drawn into public life. In 1938 she was elected as a Labour Party councillor for Aberdeen Town Council. From 1938 to 1954 she was Chair of the Council's Public Health Committee.

In 1947, she was appointed as the first female Chair of the North Eastern Regional Hospital Board, with which she served until 1960.

In 1951, she was announced as a member of a Royal Commission to look at marriage and divorce law.

She was a National Governor of the BBC from 1965−1971.

She was a member of the Maternity Services Review Committee of the Department of Health.

She had two daughters and two sons. Her daughter Joyce Baird worked as a doctor specialising in diabetes at the Western General Hospital in Edinburgh. Her son, Professor David Tennent Baird is Emeritus, and Senior Professorial Research Fellow at MRC Centre for Reproductive Health and Obstetrics and Gynaecology, University of Edinburgh.

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