The times. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1897-1901, 1900-07-29
A DIVORCE IN A HURRY
Legal Separation of Man and Wife
Between Trains.
An Unromantic and Business-Like
Transaction-A Husband Finds His
Supposed Deceased spouse Remar-
ricd and RcIinquishes All Claim
10 Hcr-A Bright Lawyers Work.

1.-The quickest divorce decree ever known
is, think, recorded on The books of the
Arapahoe County Court" said Otto Mears,
of Denver, at the Cochran Hotel last
night Mr. Mears has Just returned from
Colorado where he has extensive railroad
interests and he is also well known in
Washington as the President OF the Chesa-
peake Beach Railway which connects the
Capital with the bay-side resort.
"Of course the Dakotas and Oklahoma
are entitled to every consideration in the
competition for divorce honors. but 1 do
not believe that either of them can pro-
duce a case where a man was granted
separation from his wife while in the
State on a stop-over ticket, 1t was in the
early SOS and in dispensing justice sound
reasoning was accepted as readily and
sometimes in preference to legal prece-
dents Several years before the occurrence
a couple living in Brooklyn, feeling the
pangs OF enforced icieness, the husband
decided to seek fortune in the rapidly de-
veloping West. With hopes of glitterins
success he set out for Chicago promising
his better half that as soon as employment
was found he would send for her. Like
thousands of others the hardy BroOklynlte
found the glittering tales of prosperity that
fell to all in the Windy City had been
greatly magnifed and in his disappoint-
ment two weeks elapsed before he had the
courage to write his wife. But IN the
meantime the stringencies OF want mad
been felt by the woman and she gave up
her former abode moving to New YORK
CITY TO await word from her husband.
This shifting about led to the miscar-
riaga of the husbands letters, and the
couple were as effectively separated as IL
they inhabited different planets. Each
made every effort possible to discover the
other but without avail, and nearly ten
years rolled by, the wife accepting the be-
lief that her husband was dead. In the
course of time she met German brewer,
and after being duly courted, accepted an
offer to double up. The wife with her sec
ond husband removed to Denver, and there
they lived for several years in ignorance OF
the existence OF husband No. l.
Several years later husband No. l was
again moved by that FESTIVE spirit tnat
guides wealth seekers in the path pointed
out by Horace Greeley, ant gathering to-
gether his belongings he started for the
promising West. Seattle was the objective
point this time, and with much the same
visions that had accompanied him on his
last Western move, he settled down in the
seat of a Burlington smoker en- route for
Denver From here he was to take the
Denver and Rio Grande across the Divide
to the glorious Pacific. Following every
precedent, husband No. l engaged In con-
versation with a smoker in another seat,
and pretty soon the two were exchanging
courtesies like old friends. The stranger
was from Denver. and when husband NO.
/ mentioned his name il brought to the
strangers mind something familiar. After
moments thought he recalled that one
of his CO. workers in a Denver brewery had
married a woman Of that name. Yes, she
was from the East he replied to the anx-
ious queries of husband No. l, and had
previously been married
This discovery gave husband No. /