D. Gladys Hodge, a Dodge descendant

Gladys Hodge.

Della Gladys Hodge, who was born 90 years ago in the white house at the southeast corner of Bridgegate Square, died Sunday afternoon, Aug. 5, in Providence.

She was a direct descendent of Trustum Dodge, one of the band of first European settlers on Block Island. Through her youth and until the Hodge home on Corn Neck Road burned in 1976, she was a regular summer resident of the island.

She lived most of her life in Rumford, R.I., and was a real estate broker for more than 20 years, retiring in 1975. She left her home in December 1999 to move into the Hallworth House in Providence, where she died.

Gladys was born 25 minutes after her twin sister Barbara, said Claire Pike, a first cousin of the twins. Their grandfather was Winfield Dodge, whose daughter Hazel May married William "Billy" Jones. The Jones home was on Harris Point, now sometimes called Breezy Point. Hazel died when the twins were young, Pike recalled.

"The family story is that the family lived on the island in the summers and went to the mainland in the winters," said Judith Hodge Porteus, a daughter of Gladys Hodge. The twins attended East Greenwich Academy, their tuition, according to Pike, paid by an aunt who had married into the Lydia Pinkham family, makers of a nostrums and elixers for women in the 19th and early 20th Century.

Gladys, and Barbara, cut a swath on the island in her youth. "She was a high-stepper, a lot of fun," said Edith Blane.

The twins graduated from the Katherine Gibbs School in Providence and Gladys had a brief career as a secretary before marriage in 1932. "My mother married the night clerk at the National Hotel and Barbara married the day clerk," said Porteus. Gladys?s husband was Paul Hodge, who became a prominent lawyer in Providence and played an active role in establishing zoning on Block Island.

Gladys and Paul purchased land on Corn Neck Road, part of the old Sheffield farm, according to Blane. Albion Slate, Gladys?s first cousin, built them a house there. "It was in the 1940s and the house cost $50,000," recalled Claire Pike, a sister of Albion Slate.

This 24-acre parcel with broad views of the mainland coast has sat vacant since the farm burned. Conservation organizations have long expressed an interest in protecting it as open space.

Gladys Hodge was made a life member of the Handicraft Club in Providence after 50 yeas of membership; she did needlepoint and enameling, Porteus said. She was a founding member of the Block Island Historical Society, a member of what was the Block Island chapter of the Order of Eastern Star, a member of the Esek Hopkins Chapter of the daughters of the American revolution and of the Magna Carta Dames, whose members can trace their genealogy to the earls of England who forced the crown to sign the Magna Carta in 1215.

She is survived by two daughters, Judith Porteus of Seekonk and Jane B. Hodge of Cambridge, Mass., a son, Paul D. Hodge of Boston, her sister Barbara Jones Taylor of Barrington, and two grandchildren.

A memorial service was scheduled for 11 a.m. Saturday, Aug. 11, at the Swan Point Chapel on Blackstone Boulevard in Providence. Memorial donations may be made to the Block Island Historical Society or to the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation at 500 LBJ Freeway, Suite 250, Dallas, Tex., 75244.