"INCOMPATIBLE."

Auckland Star, Volume LXX, Issue 55, 7 March 1939, Page 7

"INCOMPATIBLE."

SAYS TOM MOONEY.

SEEKING A DIVORCE? • ALLEGATIONS BY WIFE. (From Our Own Correspondent.) : SAN FRANCISCO, February 10. The Labour world has been astonished •t its' recently liberated Tom Mooney, of San Francisco, allegedly demanding a divorce from his wife Rena, who told a San Francisco interviewer of the fact and added: "But I won't let him have it." Mrs. Mooney, who grew old and grey waiting for her man to be released from San Quentin Penitentiary, and whose wedding anniversaries were merely forlorn milestones on a lonely road, was emphatic. "Tom has talked to me about a divorce. I cannot understand why, after what we have been through. Maybe it is because he wants all the applause — the crowds, the cheers, the bands. What is there left for me ? • This. ..." She was seated at her copyist desk at the San Francisco Federal Music Project, an organisation dispensing virtual Government relief. She was wearing a neat, pink smock, but it was faded like her tired eyes. Under it was a plain yellow dress, formless as a sack. It was in striking contrast to the well-groomed, well-to-do business man appearance of Mooney to-day, for he has been touring California receiving great receptions on a lecturing campaign.

All day, said Mrs. Mooney, she sits at her desk, peering through tortoiseshell glasses, transcribing orchestra scores, thundering symphonies, and gay, light pieces. But to her they are merely black dots and hieroglyphic musical terms, all to be spaced by bars.—bars almost as grim as those that once held Tom Mooney. These bars hold her prisoner, for Rena Mooney is on relief.

Through those endless nights during Tom Mooney's San Quentin years she had but one thought. And that was how they would start life anew some day, together.

He is the Hero. ' She was at his side when he was released recently from San Quentin, the world's largest prison. She was at his side at the pardon hearing in the California Capitol at Sacramento, and on his triumphant return to San Francisco, scene of the memorable Preparedness Day parade bombing outrage in July, 1916.

Mrs. Mooney thought that she and her husband would continue their life together after the plucky fight she waged for years to secure his release and vindication. That was why Rena Mooney was stunned at the talk of a divorce.

"Tom is a hero," she said. "He takes trips on 'planes, travels, make personal appearances, wears nice suits. I earn only £9 a month here. They won't let me see the books on Tom's income. They figure I'm an anchor to Tom. "We've been through too m,uch to thinfe of divorce. We've been married 27 yea-rs. I'm 61 now. We're old. I want to spend the remaining years with Tom Mooney —the old Tom Mooney. "I fought to save him from the gallows, t fought for his freedom. I never had much money; only what I could eke out from my little music studio. I'm a music teacher. What money I earned went for Tom. I remember making out-of-town trips, to speak on his behalf, and having to borrow the train or bus fare. "During the 1933 depression things were blackest. I was honestly considering digging worms in my back yard and selling them for bait to the fishermen at Municipal Pier. I'd like to go with Tom and be present at his personal appearances. But they won't let me. Well, I won't let them part us. Not even San Quentin could do that."

Mooney's Reply. Tom Mooney was furious at the publication of the interview, and in a formal statement concerning divorce reports, he declared that he and Rena Mooney had been for the past sixteen years "totally and completely incompatible." He" evaded direct queries as to whether he had asked his wife of 27 rears for a divorce or whether he contemplated such, a step. j

To such a query Mooney said: "I asked for a divorce while I was in prison many years ago, as the only possible solution, but she refused then. We have not resumed marital relations since my release, and I have not seen her since the Los Angeles meeting in the middle of January."

In his statement, released at his downtown hotel in San Francisco, after a conference with Herbert Reisner. counsel for the Tom Mooney Defence League, he added: "For Rena Mooney, I have the greatest possible sympathy. The truth of the matter is, the lives of Mrs. Mooney and myself are now and have been for the past sixteen years totally and completely incompatible.

Mrs. Mooney has in no way, shape or form, been connected with my defence organisation for the past sixteen years.

"I'm going to ask the public to withhold any snap judgment on any alleged statements of Mrs. Mooney concerning a divorce, for the time being."

Although she scouted a report quoting her as saying Tom had asked for a divorce, Mrs. Mooney, on the verge of tears, said she would welcome a talk with him on the matter. "I am willing to talk to him about it, jf he wants to talk to me," she said. "Tom knows where he can reach me."

Mooney added: "This story is meant to do more than delineate supposed domestic troubles between us, I think the story was inspired. It doesn't affect Tom Mooney or his wife, but it affect* the pardon fight of Warren K. Billings, and the entire Labour movement."