Dorothy Ross

Dorothy Ross, an influential historian of ideas, died on Wednesday May 22, 2024 at her home in Washington, DC.
Dorothy was born in Milwaukee on August 13, 1936, daughter of Irving Rabin and Ida Holland Rabin, Jewish immigrants who had come from Russia as children. Her father ran a dry goods business and sold real estate; her mother was a secretary at a local utility. Feeling confined by the community in which she had grown up, Dorothy embraced the intellectual stimulation of Smith College, which she attended on scholarship. There she found in History a subject and approach that helped her understand not only her own roots, but contemporary political and social trends, including McCarthyism, which was strong in Milwaukee and which she vehemently opposed. Following graduation in 1958, she married Stanford G. Ross, an international tax lawyer who would become Commissioner of the Social Security Administration in the Carter administration. The couple had two children, John and Ellen.
Dorothy went on to obtain a PhD from Columbia University in 1965 where she studied with the distinguished historian Richard Hofstadter. Moving from New York to Washington, and then between Washington and Princeton while the children were young, she turned her dissertation into her first book. She embraced the role of Special Assistant to the American Historical Association's newly formed Committee on Women Historians (1971-72), overseeing efforts to reduce sex discrimination in the profession by creating a roster of qualified women historians to be sent to prospective employers.
Entering academe, Dorothy taught at Princeton (1972-76) and the University of Virginia (1978-1990) before joining the History Department of Johns Hopkins University as the Arthur O. Lovejoy Professor of History in 1990. A series of influential articles and books on the history of the social sciences brought her national and international acclaim. Her first book, G. Stanley Hall: the Psychologist as Prophet (1972), demonstrated the ways in which a single life could illuminate major developments in psychology and education. The Origins of American Social Science (1991) is a learned analysis of the ways in which belief in American exceptionalism influenced the development of the social sciences. In the words of historian Dan Borus, she combined "encyclopedic knowledge with stunning inventiveness." She was the recipient of many professional awards. In 2023, Johns Hopkins University established the Dorothy Ross Professorship, a rare honor.
Dorothy was a generous teacher and mentor who encouraged intellectual excellence in students and younger scholars. At Hopkins she thrived as a teacher of graduate students who, according to Francois Furstenberg, found that "her ferocious intellect was matched by an unstinting generosity." A gift she made to Hopkins in 2023 established a fund for support of History graduate students. And when the Society for U.S. Intellectual History established the annual Dorothy Ross Prize, it did so for the best academic article in U.S. intellectual history published by an emerging scholar.
After her retirement in 2007, Dorothy remained professionally active. In her mid-eighties, she published two important articles in Modern Intellectual History that explored liberals' retreat from social democratic values, a subject that had engaged her in her youth, indeed in much of her work. During the pandemic she became a mainstay of a small group of women historians who had built their friendships in the early days of the movement for inclusion in the profession, and who now contemplated issues of historical and contemporary complexity.
For all her professional accomplishments, Dorothy was down-to-earth and unassuming. She was a good listener and a loyal and honest friend who was devoted to her family. In contrast to their busy lives in Washington, the Rosses enjoyed summers at their home in Wellfleet, Massachusetts, where she and Stan found joy and serenity in the natural beauty of the seashore and the spectacular sunsets they savored from their deck.
Stan died in 2020 after 62 years of marriage. Dorothy is survived by her children, John Ross (Choedron) and Ellen Finn (Michael); grandchildren Emma Finn and Kayla Finn, and her brother Herb Rabin (Annie).
As her daughter Ellen observes: "She will be remembered fondly not only for her formidable intellect, but for her fierceness at croquet, hearts, tennis, and all board games; her terrible driving; and her chocolate chip snowman pancakes." Her son John adds: "I will always remember the courage, dignity and generosity of spirit that my mother displayed while dying, and throughout her life, but most of all I will remember her unconditional love for all her children and grandchildren."
Dorothy would wish donations in her memory to be sent to charities devoted to girls' education in developing countries: Campaign for Female Education [CAMFED] and Lotus Outreach International.
A Zoom Memorial service will be held at a later date.