Dolores Duncan Wharton was born on July 3, 1927 in New York City. She married Clifton Wharton Jr. in 1950 and they had two children. She earned a degree in Art History from Chicago State University while her husband did graduate work at the University of Chicago. Her knowledge and love of art, as well as time spent living in Malaysia, inspired her to write Contemporary Artists of Malaysia: A Biographic Survey, published in 1971. When Clifton became President at Michigan State University and chancellor at State University of New York, she took active roles as first lady at both institutions. At MSU she had an active role in the committee to build a performing art center on campus, which ultimately became the Clifton and Dolores Wharton Center for the Performing Arts. In 1971 she became a council member for the National Endowment for the Arts. In 1974, she was appointed to board of Michigan Bell Telephone Company. She was the first African American and woman to serve on several boards including Kellogg, Phillips Petroleum and Gannett as well as others. Dolores Wharton founded the non-profit Fund for Corporate Initiatives in 1980 providing programs to help minority women achieve in business. It later expanded into the Young Executive Program.