These Red Cross workers have arrived safely in Iceland for duty with the American armed forces stationed there. Left to right (front row): Margaret Singer, Uniontown, Md.; Jane Goodell, New York, N.Y.; Helen Lee Stephenson, Washington; and Camelia Greethwan, Washington.
Back row: (Left to right), Mary Dolliver, Fort Dodge, Ia.; Betty Quinlan, Waynesville, N.C.; Doris Thain, Birmingham, Ala., Jane Duncan, Washington; and Elizabeth Clark, Framingham Center, Mass.
Mary Dolliver is a sister of James I. Dolliver, Fort Dodge, former state commander of the American Legion. She left her job as recreational director of the Birmingham, Ala. Coal Co. to go to Iceland.
Source: The Des Moines Register, February 2, 1942 (group photo included)
Mary Dolliver At Busy Post
By Gordon Gammack
(Des Moines Register and Tribune Staff Writer in the Italian War Theater)
NAPLES, ITALY -- Whenever there's a knock on the door of Miss Dolliver's office at Red Cross headquarters in Naples, it's a good bet it's a soldier trying to find a Red Cross girl.
During the hour I visited Miss Dolliver, who hails from Fort Dodge, Iowa, one soldier after another poked his head in the door with the usual question, "where do I find Miss So and So?"
The Red Cross girls who cheer up the sick and wounded in the hospitals, help men to have a good time in the rest camps and clubs and serve doughnuts and coffee to pilots when they come in from mission and to doughboys when they are brought from the front lines, are tremendously popular.
Main Job
"Our main job is not so much to furnish the men with things -- although that's very important -- but to remind them that their wives and sisters and sweethearts are waiting for them back home," said Miss Dolliver, who at present is in charge of Red Cross personnel in Italy.
Rose Mary Ames, the movie actress is perhaps the most sought-after Red Cross girl in Italy although lately the soldiers have been getting a little competition from George Raft.
One of the knocks on Miss Dolliver's door came from a handsome young officer looking for Miss Ames.
Competition
"She's mighty hard to catch up with," said Miss Dolliver, adding that the competition for attention was pretty terrific.
"I know," said the officer, "she's my sister."
Miss Dolliver has done an outstanding Red Cross job, first suffering all kinds of hardships in Iceland then serving as assistant director of Empire Red Cross club in Oran, North Africa, the biggest Red Cross club in the world, and now continuing her work in Naples.
Help
Most of the American soldiers who started out with the division now fighting in Italy have been entertained at the Empire club in Oran.
What impresses Miss Dolliver as much as anything is the response and help you get from people in Fort Dodge and through out Iowa.
"Look at that," she said pointing to a stack of magazines, "they all come from Iowa; you just can't beat the Iowa people."
Fort Dodge
Iowans started sending things for soldiers via Miss Dolliver when she was in Iceland in 1942. There wasn't anything for soldiers in Iceland when she first got there and she wrote her brother, James I. Dolliver, Fort Dodge attorney, and told him to get busy. Dolliver through his many American Legion contacts started the ball rolling,
Almost everyone in Fort Dodge started pitching in and they have sent a steady flow ever since, things that mean so much to soldiers away from home.
The Burnside Busy Bee Birthday club, the Sunshine Quilt club, Townsend club and Gypsum Workers union No. 60 are among the contributing groups.
Miss Dolliver is restless to get back to "club work" where she can work directly with soldiers.
"Those boys deserve everything we can give them -- particularly the ones at the front," she said.
Source: The Des Moines Register, February 18, 1944 (photo included)
Miss Mary Dolliver, Red Cross Director, Here For Short Visit
Miss Mary Dolliver, Red Cross personnel director, back from 40 months overseas, arrived here last evening and was an overnight guest of her cousin, Mrs. Walter Anneberg, and family. She came from Washington, D.C. where she had visited her brother and sister-in-law, Congressman and Mrs. James I. Dolliver.
Miss Dolliver was en route to Ft.Dodge where she will thank the Wa-Tan-Ye club and many other organizations who have made her and her G.I.'s their personal was project. She is to be initiated into the Ft. Dodge Wa-Tan-Ye club as an honorary member.
Fifty-seven different organizations in and around Ft. Dodge sent articles such as spoons, hard candies, phonograph records and needles, aprons, books and sheet music to Miss Dolliver at the various recreational centers where she has been stationed, all the way from Iceland to Oran, Algeria, Foggia, Italy, and the Isle of Capri.
Miss Dolliver is on leave in the States before reporting for her new assignment.
Source: Carroll Daily Times Herald, April 27, 1945
Mary Dolliver Oberlin College Dean of Women
Cleveland, O. -- Mary Dolliver, Fort Dodge, Ia., sister of Congressman James L. Dolliver of Iowa, has been appointed dean of women at Oberlin college, Oberlin, O., effective Feb.1 (Miss Dolliver is a cousin of Mrs Walter Anneberg of Carroll.)
Miss Dolliver, a graduate of Morningside college, Sioux City, has been overseas with the American Red Cross since 1941. Last year she was in charge of the Red Cross club program division in the European theater.
She presently is visiting her brother in Washington.
Source: Carroll Daily Times Herald, November 19, 1947
