Dorothy Sherry, Worldly Harborite

Dorothy Sherry — a civil servant, poet, wife, mother, and self-proclaimed bohemian who traveled the world with her husband before settling in Sag Harbor in 1959 — was so well known there that when it came time for “Voices of Sag Harbor: A Village Remembered,” a 2007 compendium published by the John Jermain Library, the book’s dedication read: 

“To two exceptional women of Sag Harbor: Mrs. Russell Sage, who gave the village its wonderful library, and Dorothy Sherry, whose hard work and devotion have done so much to enrich it.”

From the accolades following her death, on April 8 at the age of 93, it seemed there was little Mrs. Sherry couldn’t do. She was born on Jan. 19, 1926, in Sioux City, Iowa, to Arthur Townsend Briggs and Mathilda Holm Briggs, who had immigrated to this country from Oxbol, Denmark. She graduated from St. Olaf College, a Lutheran liberal arts institution, in Northfield, Minn., having mowed lawns and done odd jobs to pay for her education. 

After college, Mrs. Sherry settled in Chicago to work for the Needham, Louis & Brorby advertising agency. It was there that a colleague, John Olden Sherry, came by her desk and, her family said, “flirtatiously twirled her typewriter knob.” The gambit by Mr. Sherry (who had been on 65 bombing missions during World War II) worked. They were married on Jan. 8, 1949, in St. Louis, his hometown. 

It was the start of a journey that took the couple from New Orleans to New York City, then to Torremolinos, a village on the Costa del Sol in Spain, and then on to Tangier in Morocco and Rome. Their eldest daughter, Linda, was born in Tangier in 1953.

Tiring of the expat life, the Sherrys moved back to the United States in 1949, settling near Wytheville, Va., on a dairy farm where Mr. Sherry began publishing work as a novelist and a playwright. He recounted their time as farmers and home renovators, often hilariously, in a memoir titled “Maggie’s Farm.” The Sherrys — who by then had a second daughter, Sylvia — moved to Sag Harbor in 1959 after becoming instantly smitten with the village while visiting friends. They soon became members of a South Fork literary cohort. 

Once here, Mrs. Sherry also became active in local politics. She was on the Sag Harbor Village Board from 1976 to 1977, and volunteered with numerous groups, including the Friends of the John Jermain Library, the Sag Harbor Historical Society, the Whalers Festival, and the Hampton Day School, where she was a trustee and pulled a few shifts in its thrift shop. 

Mrs. Sherry also served on the board of directors and as an instructor for Taproots Workshops and Journal, a Stony Brook-based group that helped people 55 and older write about their life experiences in poetry and prose.

She also was an athlete who won the women’s championship at the Sag Harbor Golf Club several times and enjoyed tennis at Sag Harbor’s Mashashimuet Park.

Mrs. Sherry lived on Howard Street for 50 years before health problems persuaded her to move from her beloved Sag Harbor to the eastern shore of Maryland to be near two of her daughters. Her death, from a heart condition, occurred at the Arcadia Assisted Living facility in Chester, Md., where she had lived since 2017 and where she enjoyed elder activities such as painting, singing, and group exercise. Her husband died in 1999. She is survived by their children, Linda Sherry and Sylvia Sherry, both of Crumpton, Md., Anne Sherry of East Hampton, and by four grandchildren and five great-grandchildren.

Mrs. Sherry’s cremated remains will be buried alongside her husband’s at Oakland Cemetery in Sag Harbor on April 27 after a 3 p.m. graveside service. The family has invited all who knew her to attend.

Those interested in making memorial contributions in Mrs. Sherry’s name have been asked to consider the John Jermain Library or Save Sag Harbor.