Eliza Alma Northrup was a younger sister of Sarah Northrup Ridge. Born in 1822, Eliza was only two years old when her sister created a national scandal by marrying John Ridge. The Northrup family left Cornwall after Sarah’s marriage, relocating to Berkshire County, Massachusetts. In 1846, Eliza married Dr. Uriah Dorman, a recent graduate of the Berkshire Medical Institution.

In 1853, Eliza, her husband, and her parents moved to Wisconsin, which had become a state five years earlier.

Following the death of her husband in 1891, Eliza moved to the Indian Territory, which became the State of Oklahoma in 1907.