Dorothea Seelye was born in Chatham, New Jersey, the daughter of college professors Laurens Hickok Seelye and Kate Ethel Chambers Seelye, and the great-granddaughter of politician and college president Julius Hawley Seelye. Her mother completed a doctorate at Columbia University in 1919, two years after Dorothea was born. She was raised in Lebanon, where her parents taught at the American University of Beirut. Her sister Mary-Averett Seelye had a career in dance, and her brother Talcott Williams Seelye was a diplomat.
