Realizing the potential success of her girls (and acknowledging her chance of stardom in the entertainment industry was at best, limited), Ruby and her girlfriend Geneva Williams decided to have her daughters embark on a tour of the United States.

Under Neva's tutelage, the Wonder Children earned $400–$500 per appearance during the late 1920s, touring through Tennessee, South Carolina, Georgia and many other states.

Ruby Dandridge, still clinging to the hopes of a film career for herself and her daughters, bought four bus tickets and moved the family to Los Angeles.

After Clarence Muse, a working black actor in Hollywood (who befriended the family) told Ruby that her daughters were unlikely to meet with success in California, she enrolled them in a dancing school run by Laurette Butler.

While Neva and Ruby gained bit parts in films (Neva appeared as a maid in the Shirley Temple vehicle The Little Colonel, the Dandridge Sisters began appearing in musical sequences of films and toured over the United States, sharing bills with Nat King Cole, Mantan Moreland, and dancer Marie Bryant.

The female trio was a sort of black Andrews Sisters, singing songs in three part harmony.

The Dandridge Sisters also toured in London and Hawaii, and recorded four tracks with well-known big band leader Jimmie Lunceford and his orchestra: "You Ain't Nowhere", "Minnie the Moocher Is Dead", "I Ain't Gonna Study War No More," and a minor hit, "That's Your Red Wagon".

After touring for a year and a half, however, the Dandridge Sisters group abruptly disbanded, after Dorothy was determined to become an actress, unsatisfied with just appearances in occasional soundies or bit parts in Hollywood films.

She appeared with the Dandridge Sisters in musical sequences of the films The Big Broadcast of 1936 (with George Burns and Gracie Allen), A Day at the Races (with the Marx Brothers), It Can't Last Forever (with Ralph Bellamy and Betty Furness), Irene (with Ray Milland, Anna Neagle, and Billie Burke) and Going Places (with Louis Armstrong and Maxine Sullivan).

The album was produced by Bob Stephens and conducted by Charles Coleman, and included such tracks as "Love is Blue", "Try to Remember", "Sunny", "Strange Fruit", and "Lover Man".

Dandridge was married at least five times: Jack Montgomery (1942–1943), Warren Bracken (1945–1945), Ralph Bledsoe (1946–48), Forace Stead (1951–1953)[6] and Gustav Friedrich (1958–1968).