Hello,
I have been fascinated by the Dorothy Arnold case since I was a little girl and have been following your discussion of the case off and on over the years. When my time permits I sometimes google and see if there is anything new online about Dorothy. And I would like to contribute some of my own thoughts on the case if you don't mind a stranger popping in.
One of the reasons I am intrigued by Dorothy is I can relate to her in many ways (don't worry I don't mean that in any nutty or mystical way). Though my background is the exact opposite of Dorothy's, my parents were very like hers, they were old-fashioned even for their own time, more like Victorian in their morals and values, very strict, controlling, and intolerant. I am also a published author, so I can relate to Dorothy's desire to be a writer, and what she went through trying to pursue her dream. I have also had my own version of George Griscom in my life.
Even if she burned or tore up her rejected stories, I don't think Dorothy gave up her dream to write, though she may have been depressed for this and other more personal reasons. I have always seen the book she bought the day she vanished as a positive sign. I believe it was a book of short stories collected in book form that were originally published in The Ladies Home Journal or some such magazine, "An Engaged Girl's Sketches", if I remember the title correctly. In those days and given her family and social position, I doubt a would-be writer like Dorothy would have had the advantages we have today like writer's groups, classes, and as far as I know she did not have a literary agent to advise her. I have always seen her purchase of that particular book as a sort of study aid, like "what are they doing right that I am doing wrong?" Otherwise, to me, buying that particular book is the mental equivalent of beating herself in the head with it, or rubbing her own face in her failure, and she already had her family at home to do that for her.
I believe Dorothy found the courage to walk away that day. I think she had been thinking about it, fantasizing about it, for a long time, though whether she actually planned to do it before she left home to shop or just decided "this is the day" and made a spur of the moment decision while she was out, I'm still on the fence about that, as well as what happened to her afterwards. I also think she had resigned herself to the fact that she wanted the relationship with Griscom more than he did and that it was never really going to go anywhere, so it was nothing to hold herself back for.
Even if she never actually succeeded as a writer, there were other creative and literary or artistic avenues she might have gone down. For example, in the early days of movies it was possible to sell scenarios or storylines to the movie studios for silent movies, I have read about people doing this by sending a letter to a studio and getting $10 or $20 for it, I recall reading a famous female screenwriter from that era got her start that way. She might also have found work as a manuscript submissions reader or proofreader for a publishing house or found work of some kind behind the scenes in the film industry, in those days it was much easier to leave your old life behind and become someone new. She might even have gone to London or Paris and lost herself in bohemian/artistic circles. That might have been the reason for the brochures in her desk, maybe this was something she was considering? As for the remarks in her letter that are sometimes interpreted as sucidal, I think she was referring to what her life would be like if she continued to live it without making a change, that it was just not going to get better, and that her mother would think she was the victim of some sort of accident if she disappeared.
Of course, even if she did just walk away, that does not necessarily mean she led a long and happy life. I have always seen Dorothy as susceptible to the wrong sort of men, something may have happened to her and she did not realize she had made a mistake until it was too late. As a pampered society girl she might have found it harder living on her own, as a working class woman thanshe imagined it would be. Plus she would have been saddled with the burden of keeping her identity secret, going through life feeling like she was always looking over her shoulder, in fear of being recognized or bumping into someone she knew even in the most unlikely places (it could happen, rich people do like to go "slumming").
I think her family knew a lot more than they ever revealed, I always thought their being so quick to say she was dead or murdered was their way of saying "she is dead to us." Whether pregnancy or abortion figured into this in any way I can't say. On a much darker note, I have sometimes wondered if she might have been imprisoned by her family in an asylum under a false name because of her behavior; given the social standards of the day her affair with Griscom would have labelled her "soiled goods." Maybe she did try to walk away, was found, and that was her punishment since her family felt she had disgraced them, so a return to polite society was not possible, and even if it were maybe they didn't believe they could control her or trust her not to try again? The Arnolds had the money and power to make Dorothy disappear in that manner, inside an insane asylum or even a convent.
I have always hoped a book would be written about the case someday by someone with an investigative background who would really dig into the case and research it as much as is possible at this point, perhaps find descendants of the Arnolds, Griscom, and even maybe the friend she stayed with for Thanksgiving, maybe Theodora told her own family things she didn't tell Dorothy's family, police, or press but they were passed down in her own family?
Also, I've always been curious, does anyone know what became of George Griscom after? Did he ever marry?
I also recall reading during one of my occasional google searches on the case something about an annotated copy of Charles Fort's "Book of the Damned" or perhaps it was a letter written to him by someone who had read it, with a comment about Dorothy and Philadelphia, I wondered if anyone here had read that or looked into it?
Thank you for allowing me to comment on this fascinating case.
(MOO obviously)
