Marjorie O’Connell Shearon

**  Was born in 1890 and died in 1974

**  Had a brilliant mind

** Probably had bipolar disorder and its associated condition of hypergraphia

**  Earned a PhD in palǣontology from Columbia University in New York in 1916, yet despised ‘feminists’ and ‘career women’

**  Carried on a 10-year affair with one of her (married) university professors, Dr. Amadeus Grabau

**  Was the author of the “Dear Pal” letters to Barnum Brown in 1920

**  Trekked from New York to the Gulf Coast, and then up the Mississippi River to St. Louis, Missouri alone, on foot, in 1922

**  Married a man of few accomplishments (Mr. Shearon) who refused to let her have the children she so deeply desired

**  Worked for Senator Taft to prevent the establishment of universal health care

**  Was the writer/editor/publisher, for decades, of “Challenge to Socialism” – striving to prevent/repeal the establishment of Social Security and Medicare through her writings and testimony to Congress

**  After her husband’s death in 1960, carried on a torrid affair with a married lover for four years, which was documented in voluminous letter writing (she kept copies!), and only ended when, after his wife’s death, he abruptly married a different lover

**  Was an unrepentant racist, and hated immigrants

​**  Was gloriously contradictory and complex

**  Has been all but forgotten by history