Was There Really An Engagement Between Harry Hopkins And Dorothy Hale Or Was It A Short-Lived Relationship? Myth Number 6

Harry Hopkins, TIME Magazine July 1938

In July 1938, TIME magazine reported that WPA Administrator Harry Hopkins said “it is nobody’s god damn business” whether he was engaged to Dorothy Donovan Hale. Popular newspapers of the day began reporting on a possible engagement in March, 1938. Even LIFE magazine ran a blurb in its May edition.

The engagement was never confirmed by Harry Hopkins nor by Dorothy Hale. However, when Dorothy died on October 21, 1938 at age thirty-three, it was rumored by her friend Clare Boothe Luce that she committed suicide because Hopkins broke off their relationship. The Donovan family strongly disagreed with Luce and were confused by the many inaccurate statements made by Luce about Dorothy. The niece of Dorothy Hale said the family never accepted Dorothy’s death as a suicide. The Donovan family believed Dorothy broke off the relationship with Harry Hopkins.

Clare Boothe Luce Said Harry Hopkins Broke Off His Relationship With Dorothy Hale--Or Did He? Myth Number Five

FDR and Harry Hopkins

“Those in the know in Washington said that FDR had ordered Harry Hopkins to end his affair with Dorothy, and to marry instead Lou Macy, a close friend of the Roosevelts, which Hopkins did. Most of the gossip columnists made it brutally clear that Dorothy had been jilted.”
Clare Boothe Luce

Dorothy Hale died on October 21, 1938. Harry Hopkins, advisor to President Franklin Roosevelt, did not meet Lou Macy until the 1940s. This was over two years after Dorothy died. Harry Hopkins did eventually marry Lou Macy, but this was long after Dorothy's death.

In her famous interview about Dorothy Hale and the Frida Kahlo painting, Clare Luce insinuated that Dorothy committed suicide because Harry Hopkins broke off their relationship. The family of Dorothy Hale never believed she intended to marry Harry Hopkins. Dorothy’s father thought it was Dorothy who ended the relationship with Hopkins. Interestingly, Dorothy was seeing another man at the time of her death.

Myra Bairstow

info@dorothyhale.com

Quotes and Passages from “Frida: A Biography of Frida Kahlo” by Hayden Herrera