Dorothy Rodham, mother to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and one of the most accomplished women in American government, died at age 92 after suffering from a heart condition according to the Washington Post.
According to the Chicago Tribune, Dorothy Howell Rodham was born in 1919, the oldest daughter of a Chicago firefighter. When she was 8, her parents divorced and her and her sister, Isabelle, moved to California to live with their grandparents, who were strict authoritarians.
Rodham moved out of her grandparent's home at age 14 and worked as a housekeeper while finishing high school. She returned to Chicago after graduation hoping to reconcile with her parents, but, after being denied, worked in an office to support herself reported the Tribune.
She married Hugh E. Rodham, a traveling salesman, in 1942 and had one daughter and two sons, Hugh and Tony, years later reports the Post.
According to the Post, Rodham was a homemaker that stood by her three children and conservative Republican husband no matter what. Though she rarely gave interviews about her daughter and son-in-law, former president Bill Clinton, she followed them to Arkansas after Bill became governor, then to Washington after Bill became president, then, finally to New York after Hillary became senator.
"I owe it to my mother, who never got a chance to go to college, who had a very difficult childhood," Hillary said in a 2008 debate according to the Tribune. "But who gave me a belief that I could do whatever I set my mind."
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