Dolores Hope dies at Toluca Lake home

Dolores Hope, one of the desert's original philanthropists and whose commitment to the sick and needy helped launch Eisenhower Medical Center, died on Monday.
The 102-year-old was surrounded by family at her Toluca Lake home when she died of natural causes.
Nationally, she was known as the wife of entertainer Bob Hope who had put aside her own singing career to support her husband and raise their family.
But in the desert — the couple's home since the early 1940s —
Dolores Hope blazed her own trail by dedicating countless hours and millions of dollars to numerous local charities.
Her death comes only days after the passing of desert philanthropist Jackie Lee Houston, as well as former first lady Betty Ford in July.
“She was a very gracious lady, one of the grand ladies of the desert,” said hotelier Mel Haber, president of Angel View Crippled Children's Foundation.
For all her good deeds, Dolores Hope was most closely associated with Eisenhower Medical Center.
The Hopes donated 80 acres of land in Rancho Mirage for the hospital, which opened in 1971. Dolores Hope served as the center's founding president.
She spent more than three decades on the hospital's board, participating in every major decision and persuading her friend Betty Ford to establish a drug and alcohol rehabilitation center connected to the hospital.
“To think she was just Bob Hope's wife is a mistake,” said John Foster, president of the Humana Challenge golf tournament, formerly known as the Bob Hope Classic. “She was a sharp, bright woman at all times.”

‘A tremendous loss'

Although Hope had stayed out of the spotlight in recent years, she was part of an exclusive circle of women that included Ford, Leonore Annenberg and Barbara Sinatra, who are credited with raising money for the some of the desert's most important charities and institutions.
In many ways, credit for Eisenhower Medical Center's success belongs to Dolores to Hope.
In the 1960s, when Bob was asked to put his name on the Palm Springs Classic golf tournament, organizers said it could raise money for a community hospital. Hope agreed with a contingency: He didn't want to commit to spearheading the health care effort.
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