Dorothy was 20 in 1907, she was 'out' and New York's No. 1 Marriageable Heiress, but unusual for her natural authority, the perfect Madme Chairman, she could hold a large meeting to order. 

She marched with the Women's Trade Union League, supported the emigrant settlements of New York's East Side, and was the elected Chairman of the National Junior Leagues, a focus for activist young women with…

My heroine keeps bursting through the news;  She loved her native America and Pope Francis's quiet utterance of 'the land of the free and the home of the brave' which moved his audience to tears and cheers has echoes from her patriot's life.   She lived her first 38 years there, and in 1924 when she decided to leave the country was sliding to the right and isolationism.   If Franklin Roosevelt's political…

We are still playing with titles for Dorothy's story - when I say 'Nobody knew' it means she purposefully kept herself out of the limelight, no empty socialising, refused to use her money to exert influence, refused to join committees of the great and the good.

So, hers is a secret history BUT if you believe that the purpose of history is to make us wise in coping with the present, then she is…