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By CHRISTOPHER ROSE
Staff writer
A Q A 1? Elizabeth Meriwether Gilmer was 34, frail,
I	bookish	and decidedly unstylish, a
I \JkJ KmJ j woman of chronically ill health and trapped in a dismal marriage that would yield little passion and no children over several decades.
It?s hard to imagine that, within two years, she would become the nation?s arbiter of style, manners, courtship and marriage.
It?s hard to imagine that she envisioned for herself international fame, millions of loyal readers, travels all over the world, 1,000 letters a day and a salary that, in its era, was comparable to those of professional athletes today.
Hers became a household name ? once she changed it.
Elizabeth Meriwether Gilmer was Dorothy Dix. Her newspaper column, ?Sunday Salad,? fiijst appeared in the Daily Picayune 101 years ago today. '
Though a handful of advice columnists had appeared before her, none ever found the resonance or readership to match, none was ever labeled the ?Mother Confessor to Millions.?
Dorothy Dix?s first column was headlined, ?The Advent of Women?s Editions of Newspapers,? and it?s true that she set the standard that every Miss Lonelyhearts and etiquette queen, from Dear Abby and Ann Landers to Emily Post and Miss Manners, would follow.