The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, August 19, 1906, Page 3

AFTLR TWENTY FINDS HER FUSB NEGRO unfolded in the divorce Octoroon’is the story . of deception suul of Mrys: Albert White of Los Angeles: HE sensational disciosure that Mrs. Mary H. White has been compelled to make public in her efforts to secure a divorce from E a well - known in- s Los Angeles. has e the people of that pretty southern first to open wide, incr ous ey and then to shudder The divorce court is ouse for startling revelations judges awyers and hangers-on of t par- ular department of the Jaw are bored satiety by the recital of marital Qif- rences. [} Mrs White's stor s unusual one that even well-seasoned listeners are to ¥ nazement beside age urt narra sig ce and becomes fiix tale whose tragic details seer e offspring of the roman- er's mind than t life of a timid ange facts as she more dramatic thar The Leopard's £pc rring novels whose ¥ a himself she earned whelming trut - Shrinking from him, she looked ast v seeing eves 1er hus- s The swa skin, the full lips, eculiar exaggerated them- se t d have shrieked crouching silently n e been so blind w G with a wa smile at her daug & vehemence, quietly rejoined Never mind, now, Mamie dear. I prob- s wasn't always in the right, m tather and mother were Arkan ters,” she began. “They came Iy from the East, and were well 4 y were h delicate. r w e I was hardly an a ba 1 was left an o phan in charge of neighbors of o who already had a large family of their owp. My parents’ illness ate up most of e little capital that they had ought West with them, consequently e time I was 13 ears old 1 was epe spon the arity of the people with whom I was living. Being poor emselves, they had nothing to re for others, and the drudgery ecame so heavy 1 married an de an 1o escape @rom a condition &t cally amounted to slavery After the birth of our daughter he SHE MEETS ALBERT WHITE. was this time that I met Al- Vhite. A lonely child, robbed th of the only person who had ever shown me any affection, I was agzled by the attentions of the dash- ng, handsome young fellow., He wds an she repeated, as though had contradicted her and she ring amn excuse for the {li- she bhad innocently brought erself. “In his dark, mysterious attractive and he ex- that he was of French. birth and that many years the open air had tanned his came to see me often, took me amusements, and had such & manners that he won me He finally teld me that he e. asked me te marry” him ised to be as good to my lit- 2s though he were her own father Despite his protestations and pre- possessing ways, | hesitated. I didn't knew why. A nameless dread of some- thing I couldn’t define came over me. But I was only & child, as innocent in heart and mind &s the one I carried in my arms, and I was lonesome and vearned to have some one to love me, s0 he easily persuaded me to marry him. That was in 1885, and I was then not quite 16. It was a contract mar- riage, for he told me that was the usual form in the part of the country in which he lived. Afterward 1 grew suspicious of the contract marriage nded to be E consented secon were married in Wichita, kkan ¢ short time we lived happily er and I was beginning to think aver. It ght home roduced to atrick. He ad engaged I knew my hi ce was not la employing ) know why expense ar negr en I found e pretensze a as on the most Mr. White, even first name and wearing te with us, and attempted a coal-b with le familiarities with me. 1 pre- tended not to see them, as my husband appeared to overlook them. One day Lowever, the negro called me ‘Mary. and 1 felt that a stop should be put to the man’s insole I spoke to Mr White, but was still more mystified when he only laughed st me. I then openly showed the negro the feeling 1 had toward him. and he displayed for me the bitterest hatred. He showed it in taunts and jeers and veiled innu- endoes to the effect that 1 was no be ter than he. 1 didn’t Xnow what to do. Mr White strange ignored the im- pertinent negro's c and at times seemed to have ite affection for inally one day Fitzpatrick er top far and caused an open rup " my husband and me 15 mischievousn and Interference recoiled upon his own head My hus- bend, furious, turned Fitzpatrick out of the house, but at the same time he treated me and spoke to me in a man- ner that was entir foreign to him. I was more puzzled than hurt His manner placed me almost on a social level with the negro he had just dis- missed. In fact, from the day Fitzpatrick came to live with us there was an In- definable change in my husband. I did not understand it then.” She shivered and, stopped. but moment went bravely on “I can't exactly explain I had about him at this cause I struggled so hard 1 thought that I was partly that the trouble was fault 2nd was the result of over- wrought nerves. As nearly as I can express it mow, it was as though his gentleness and good breeding had been but @ thin veneer that the negre had taken off. Yet in public he appeared the same &5 ever We went out as much usyal, and entertained our friends as we'd always done; still the feeling | had did not wear off. Finally the strange aversion I had for Mr. White so overcame me that, taking the two children with mg, I fled from him. "He came a few days later to where 1 was staying. He seemed his old self again; like he used to be before we were married. He made love to me, and conquered what seemed my un- reasoning antipathy. I returned home in a the feeling time, be- agalnst it. to blame, mentally my with him. “For a few months we were both happy. Then Mr. White gradually slid back again into the way he had acted when Fitzpatrick lived with us. By degrees that vague Teeling came over me again. I found myself shrinking I so lost control of band. e noticed in- o LA M ' TITE A ED S stead of trying to calm me he became enraged. Frightened, 1 grabbed the two children and ran away. Deter- mined to have nothing more te do with him I brought an action against him for divorce, My decree was not granted. S My suit for divorce seemed to change the man entirely. It was as though 1'd never known him. A latent savagery began to show itself, and I watched with wonder and an unnamed dread a peculiar coarseness-develop in him. Although falling to get a di- vorce T refused to have anything to do with him, (Every time he came -to see me my feeling of loathing grew stronger, and it required all the self- restraint T had to keep him from see- ing it. But he felt a difference in my manner toward him, and became very ‘bitter, “Thinking to compel me to return to him, he went to the hospital where our baby,. little Della, was just recoy- ering from a severe iliness. He asked to gee the matron, and while the nurse went In search of her he anatched Della from her bad and made his esecape with her. “Ie was “Immediately notified, and, nearly frantie with grief and alarm, went to the police statlon™ I tried there to get an'order for my baby, but I was told that T could not de this Without a good deal of formality, and, consid- ering the eircumstanc perhaps’ not at all. t seemed for a minute as though 1 should go mad. T told the police that I'd get the child myself, it T gied In the attempt.” g The fragile little woman straight- ened in her chair and the lips that had been tremuleys as she told of her suf- ferings, now smoothed themselves out and closed firmly upon each other. She went on: “I went to our eld home here in Los Angeles, something telling me he would take the child there, An officer in plain clothes followed. Mr. White was at home, and little Della was on the sofa crying. 1 opened the door quickly, went in and grabbed the baby in my arms before he realized what had hap- pencd. He pursued me, of course, and Just as 1 got outside the door, caught up with me. He asked me to return to him. and when I refusad, in my ex- DF a QUZ2ROON citement showing the contempt I reals ly felt, he tried to spatch littie Della from me. The officer who had followed, ALBERT 7o Br interfered. Then Mr. White lost his head. “‘Keep your baby, he cried. ‘Who wants a nigger baoy, anyway?® nearly dropped little Della. ‘What are vou saving, Albert?” 1 sereamed. “‘You want a divorce’ he went on with an ugly sneer. ‘Why don’t you gel it on the ground that you're mar- ried to a colored man?” “The way. he s made me start and look at him S|om too. that the negro zpat said to me, burned upon my memory My overwronght feelings. my h strange conduct, Fltzpatrick’s all these flashed through my brain, ex- plained at last. But I refused to be- lieve. 1t didn’t seem possible that any- thing so awful could o me. | 4 sband's had endured poverty ar worlk, but disgrace had never visited me. “'Say it's nat frue, A say it's not true!’ “1 tound myself slipping to my knees. “‘Find out,’ he laughed, and went into the hogse.” Mrs/ White stopped. crowding out her utterance. time she concluded: “I went to see my lawyers and asked them to find out for me all about Albert Sobs were After a White. Their Investigations have proved my worst suspleions. Mr. White s a Tennessee quadroon. His real name i8 John Fitapairick and he a full brother of the negro Fitzpatrick who lived with us. T could I marriage annulled on the s L& belug colored. for the la States of Arkansas and Kansas. which our twe marriages in took place, LABOR’S WAGE FOR REBUILDING CITY--175 MILLIONS (Continued from Front Page.) tained by much figuring. Mathematics does dot offer a romantic ~astime, but it obtains tota wide interest as touching a city sing through an epoch that will always be important to the world's history. About 18,000 buildings were, de- stroyed by the fire and all of this number will eventually be rebuilt. They will be rebuilt of permanente type and of better material than com- posed them when laid waste by the Mames. 1t is safe to say that at least 12,000 structures will be huilt of brick and concrete. Four thodsand tempo- rary struetures have been hammered up since the disaster at an, average cost of about $1000, aggregating $4,- Under ordinary circumstances ar- chitects and structural engineers esti- mate that in wooden structures labor amounts to fifty per cent of the. total cost, This percentage has not ob- tained during the past few months because of the increase in the price of lumber. The raise in carpenters’ wages, even when figuring in aver- time and Sundays, has not kept pace with the boosting of the price .of lumber. Approximately, however, the labor in the ercction of four thousand wooden and galvanized iron buildings that have been provided for the tem- porary shelter of commercial enter- prises has_ cost from thirty-five to forty per cent, or about $1.500,600. Before temporary huilding has “erectin, stopped the carpenters will undoubt- edly receive another million. By that time there will be ample demand for them in the parmanent buildings that will gradually rise and crowd out the shacks. The best way of calculating the cost of the reconstruction of the city is to take some standard building as a_gauge and figure from that. En- gineers with whom I discussed the subject declared .that a four-story brick building on a lot 44x110 feet is as good a standard as could be taken. Experts who know the rebuilding sit- uation say that using such a standard it is safe to figure on 12,000 perma- nent buildings. In the construction of a. four-story building of the type mentioned 548,- 000 bricks are used. Ten years ago 1000 bricks could be bought and lad for $11. Today in San Franciseo it costs almost as much for the labor. A- bricklayer can lgy ten hundred bricks in seven hours and at the pres- ent rate of wages he makes 87.5 cents an hour. This makes his labor in lay- ing 1000 bricks cost $6.12. Then there is almost $4 for the hoCcarrier and other labor to figure in on the work, bringing, the total up to about $10 & thousand. Thus the wages of labor in a 348,000-brick building would ge about $3500. In 12,000 such buildings the grand total would be more than sixty million dollars. If, as has been estimated, 6.57 000,000 bricks go into the rebuilding of San Francisco, the aggregate earn- ings of the bricklayers alone em- ployed on the work will be something like forty-six miliions. Other labor 70, work of hod- the mortar will get out of the carrying and preparing twenty-three millions. One billion feet of lumber will go into the rebuilding. A few years ago this amount of lumber would have cost less than fifteen miilions. Now it is cesting much more. Whatever the coat hitnber, there seems no doubt that the carpenters and joiners will receive more than ten miilions of the money spent in the rebuilding. As a rule, plumbing is estinrated at about ten per cent of the cost of the building. Consequently the plumbing in a brick building of the sort I have used for a standard, presuming it to cost when complete $35000, would be $3300. or re- Ordinarily the quired to instail the plumbing is esti- mated at twenty-five per cent of the cost of the material, so that the plumbers would get $875 out of each building. Then before all the 12, buildings were finished and ready for occypancy the plumbers would have received ten and one-hali millions in wages. This would be doing rather well even for the plumbers. . Every permanent building that will rise over the burned area must be plastered, and there would be stapped on the walls of a four-story brick building forty-five feet wide by 110 feet deep 5000 square yards of plaster. In 12000 buildings the walls would be covered with sixty million yards. Common seratch -brown plaster usualiy costs about twenty-five cents a yard when on the wooden lath. The same materizl with a plaster-of-paris finish. using a metal lath on wood studding, costs more thun twice as forbid a white person te marry either a negre, mulatto, quadroon or ectefoen. “But there are the children. Such as he is, he is their father. [ don't want to have the marriage deeldred null and void on their account. What an: I to 4 If it weren't far the two children I'd_put an end to my unfor- t e life She wrung her hands and the féars flowed at last “I can’t let the children bear it alone. T breught it on them and I'll do_my duty by them. Why, if they hadn’t ‘me, they might deacend to the level of their father's family. Oh, the shame of it™ or wch a sorrow there Were no words. We left her with her face ir her hands, s nt sobbing, as Al- bert White's twe children came into the room. The boy, Osmund D. is 10 years old. and little Della 5. They are beth i of complexion like their mother, with blonde hair. They de not skow the slightest trace of ealored! bload, although their features regém- ble those of the father. White himself refuses to discuss.the case, and will neither deny nor admit that he is a negro. Mrs. White's lawyers say they have, discovered that White was in constant communication with colored friends in the South: that he met them surrepti- tiously, or when he left home ostensi- bly an business trips. Ile told his rel-, atives that he had married “a pretty' waite girl who didn’t suspect Such Is the strange story of woman's life one + much, so that the average cost would be in the viginity of forty cents a yard. Sixty million yards would cost $6,000,000, labor and all, the plaster-! ers getting at least ten per cent of they final cost under nmormal conditions. Labor conditions, however, are mnot normal and the plasterer is making! from forty to fiity per cent mere than usual, so that his wa be in the neighborhood of een..per cent, if not more. Thus there wrib be $000,000 as the plasterers’ shafe of the reconstruction millions, Incidental to the rebuilding of San Francisco there are many industrial, manufacturing and railroad enter- prises under way that demand the services of a separate army of labor-, ers. The Western Pacific Railroad is now advertising for 10,000 laborers, for construction weork on the tracks running into San Francisco ferry ap- proaches. Other big contractors who are doing quarry work, the hauli sand and the digging of gravel fort footing and superstructural n the new and greater city eam” use 5000 more men than are at hand. Al- together the incidents to the récan- struction will employ 13,000 laborers during the period of the next five, years. With the average wage sateg %or these toilers estimated at $2 a-day, the daily payroll for incidental labor! will foot up to $30,000. This is $18¢,- a week or $9.360,000 a year. In‘ five years this would add up to $46,- 800,000. And adding it to the aluuq estimated two-hundred millions, .w: would get the ultimate total of $346,- 800,000 as labor’s earnings. BARTON W. CURRIE