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The Atlanta Georgian,
Wednesday, 27th August 1913,
PAGE 6.
MRS. F. V. L. SMITH.
Frank Trial 'Temporary Widow' and Husband Happily 'Reunited.'
"If you are not sure whether you love your husband, let him serve on a jury for four weeks-then you'll know!"
Mrs. Frederick V. L. Smith, of No. 481 Cherokee Avenue, said it-and sighed. But it was a happy sigh, for Mr. Smith, his face wreathed in one of those "I, John, take thee, Mary" smiles, was coming hurriedly up the sidewalk home from business fully an hour earlier than usual.
Not 24 hours before they had been reunited, after Mr. Smith had been a stranger to his own home-a stranger to every place except the Kimball House and the courtroom-for four long weeks, serving on the famous Frank jury.
"I don't think there is anything," Mrs. Smith continued, "that would cause a woman to realize how much she loved her husband as to have him be on a jury; to be a 'widow' and yet know that your husband is in the same city that you are."
"Let him pass you two or three times a day, and not be allowed to speak to him-only to look and wave a handkerchief. Let those old deputy sheriffs stop him when he goes to say 'hello,' and caution you to be quiet when you start to ask him if he is being taken care of, if he gets enough to eat and if his clothing needs mending-why, I don't see how you can help making a vow never to speak a cross word to him."
"Little Dan Cupid may hear the burden during courtship and honeymoon, but after marriage he has a great aid in jury service. I'll just bet if a woman who fusses and nags her husband would let him serve on a jury for a month or so she'd be permanently cured."
"It's a terrible thing to be a temporary widow. There must be a better word to ... it than 'terrible,' but if there is I don't know it, unless I say it was simply awful. I had almost rather husband would be dead than be on a jury. I don't think a real widow has a bit harder time than a 'temporary one.'"
Mrs. Smith, besides being one of the most beautiful of the eleven "temporary widows," is also one of the most remarkable. When her husband was caught in the jury net he was not given time to get any one to take charge of his business.
So Mrs. Smith, despite the fact that she had a baby to take care of, stepped into the breach, and during the four weeks of the trial was conducted her husband's business affairs as well as he could himself. Every morning saw her at his office in the Empire Building-and every noon and evening saw her at the doors of the courthouse waving greetings to her "dead" husband.
Wife at Last Collapses.
The strain, however, was too great, and during the last week of the trial Mrs. Smith worked solely on her "nerve." She came home Monday evening very nervous, and shortly after 8 o'clock, when she received a telephone message from her husband that he was coming home, she collapsed.
Mr. Smith, returning at 10 o'clock after an absence of four weeks, found his wife unconscious and physicians bending over her. Mrs. Smith was unconscious for nearly two hours, and for more than half an hour of that time it was feared she was dead. By Tuesday afternoon, however, she had fully recovered her strength.