Hester Crawford Dorsey Richardson (1862-1933)
Hester Crawford Dorsey was born in 1862 in Baltimore. She and her friend Louisa C. Osburne Haughton recognized the need for a woman’s club focused not only on reading, but also on advancing female authorship, and the two founded the Woman’s Literary Club of Baltimore in 1890. Though the two founders were offered the presidency of the Club, they both demurred; Dorsey accepted the position of second vice president. She resigned her post and became an honorary member after marrying journalist Albert Richardson in 1891 and moving to New York. Richardson paid frequent visits to the Club thereafter, clearly proud of what it had become.
Richardson produced a diverse portfolio of writings, including poetry, essays, and several books on Maryland history and genealogy. Her poem “Dethroned,” about the short-lived Maximilian I of Mexico, was publicly recognized by his older brother, the Austrian Emperor Francis Joseph, and opened the door for Richardson’s literary career. She penned a series of articles for the Baltimore American newspaper under the penname “Selene,” which were dubbed the “Selene Letters.” Her most lasting work, Side-lights on Maryland History (1913), was originally published serially in the Baltimore Sun, and treated the early history of Maryland through a series of sketches of prominent Maryland families (including her own). Her writing asserted female intellect and wit while nevertheless hewing to nineteenth-century domestic values.
Relation
Albert Levin Richardson
Sources
“A Compliment from Royalty.” New York Times, Sept. 10, 1886.
“Books and Authors.” Current, Oct. 9, 1886: 239. (Note: Dorsey’s poem “Good-by” is also published on page 230.)
Crane, Frank and Edward Jewitt Wheeler, ed. Current Opinion, Vol. 5 (New York: The Current Literature Publishing Co., 1890), 91.
“General Gossip of Authors and Writers.” Current Literature, August 1890.
Willard, Frances E., ed. A Woman of the Century: Fifteen-Hundred Biographies with over 1,400 Portraits, Vol. 2 (Buffalo, NY: Moulton, 1892), 617.
“Woman’s Literary Club. Mrs. Wrenshall Gives a Review of the Year’s Work, and Mrs. Richardson Reads a Paper.” Baltimore Sun, June 7, 1899.
“Hester Crawford Dorsey Richardson.” Find a Grave. Accessed May 1, 2018.
“Woman’s Literary Club. Sirs. Albert L. Richardson, of Pittsburg One of the Founders, the Guest of Honor.” Baltimore Sun, Apr. 5, 1899.
Requardt, Cynthia. “Club History.” The Woman’s Literary Club of Baltimore. Accessed May 5, 2018. http://loyolanotredamelib.org/Aperio/WLCB/club-history
Contributors
Katie Kazmierski; Katie Shiber