Mom, Entrepreneur, And Inspiration
Until Saturday, nothing, but nothing, could stop the indefatigable force that was Dorothy Dolphin. A hardscrabble upbringing during the Great Depression, the sudden death of her young husband, the glass ceiling for women in the mid-20th-century business world — she overcame them all during her 87 years.
“Her energy level was amazing,” said her daughter, Kathy Dolphin, on Sunday, a day after her mother’s death.
“She never retired. She was giving speeches until age 82. She spoke to tons and tons of women’s groups. And when she would lay out how many problems she’s overcome in life, that had a way of motivating people.”
When Dolphin wasn’t building a business empire (banks, fast-food franchises and one of the Twin Cities’ foremost staffing companies), Dolphin was inspiring other women to start their own businesses. When she wasn’t serving on countless boards, most passionately in higher education, Dolphin was nurturing and prodding her young daughter, one of three children, through a mysterious, debilitating disease.
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