Who is Rowena from The Contract with God Trilogy: Life on Dropsie Avenue and what is their importance?

Rowena is a beautiful young woman, who is bound to a wheelchair. She lives in one of the last private family homes on Dropsie Avenue in 1925. Rowena marries a boy who is mute, and together, the couple builds a flower company empire. She becomes extraordinarily wealthy, and hires Abie Gold to oversee her dream of returning the Dropsie Avenue neighborhood to what it once was. She passes away a week before the final sale goes through.