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Former wife of legendary folk singer Woody Guthrie recalls life on the move
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10:31 PM PDT on Sunday, August 16, 2009
By LESLIE PARRILLA
The Press-Enterprise
It has been decades since the 92-year-old lived the long-buried memories of her former husband, legendary folk singer Woody Guthrie, but she plucks them quickly from the past and plants them firmly in the present, explaining from her Corona home how they influence her today.
Mary Guthrie Boyle is a sprightly, feisty woman with thin wisps of white hair and a fragile build that sharply contrasts with her saucy presence. Sitting on her living room couch at Crown Pointe Retirement home, she flatly refuses to answer the most private questions, warning the interviewer not to overstep personal boundaries.
"I'm gonna skin 'em all," Boyle fired at her daughter, granddaughter and great-grandson, who were sitting across from Boyle during the interview she said she wouldn't do.
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Steven Lewis / Special to The Press-Enterprise
Mary Guthrie Boyle was the first wife of Woody Guthrie. With Guthrie Boyle are granddaughter Lisa Jones and great-grandson Mason Jones II.
After answering hundreds of reporters' questions over the years about her rambling life with Guthrie, she's tired, and she dared the reporter to ask her something new.
As the wife of Woody Guthrie for 10 years, Boyle led an unconventional life, finding herself in the company of famous musicians, songwriters and celebrities and living a gypsy-like existence, traveling across the country with a man who couldn't sit still. She remembers watching actor and folk singer Burl Ives cook fried chicken for dinner and becoming close friends with actor Will Geer.
The Oklahoma couple married when she was 16 in 1933, before Guthrie gained star status as an American folk hero with his political lyrics and famous songs such as "This Land is Your Land." He considered himself a simple, guitar-picking commoner. And that counter-culture attitude attracted Boyle.
"I don't think I could have ever been happy marrying somebody and living 9 to 5," Boyle said while looking at a photo of herself on her wedding day in a simple dark dress. But Guthrie's wanderlust existence cost her and their three children -- Gwen, Sue and Bill -- when he used his salary for handouts to the less fortunate and came home empty-handed.
"Woody would go out and work and he wouldn't bring the money home. He would give it away to anyone who needed it," said Boyle's daughter, Anne.
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Ever present music
Mary Boyle said she didn't have an appreciation for the message in Guthrie's music.
"I was too young to know a lot about what it was about. Politics meant nothing to me," said Boyle, adding that she enjoyed the style of most of Guthrie's music.
She remembers spending time with famous actors and political activists and how music was ever present in their home, the company sitting around singing, taking turns tossing out lyrics.
On the table sat a recently opened letter from famous folk singer Pete Seeger, best known for writing songs such as "Turn, Turn, Turn." He wrote Boyle about meeting her in 1940 and how he would never forget that, and then reminisced about Guthrie.
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"Makes me feel like I wish to hell he was here," said Boyle about the letter Seeger signed "Old Pete" that was accompanied by a sketch of a banjo.
When people find out Boyle was the first wife of Guthrie, who died in 1967, she gets roped into attending events festivals that promote his music and political message of protesting social injustice, or connecting people within the folk music industry.
A talent for painting
"The postman found out who I was because he delivered the mail to (the name) Guthrie," remembers Boyle, leading her to connect Woody's son, Arlo Guthrie, also a folk singer, to perform at a local event.
Above Boyle's bed hangs a copy of a dark-colored oil painting of Christ by Guthrie, given to the Catholic church where they married, in exchange for money they did not have to cover the cost of the ceremony. She described his painting as a talent overshadowed by his music. And on an adjacent wall hangs the original handwritten lyrics by Guthrie to "This Land is Your Land," entitled "God Blessed America" and signed "All you can write is what you see -- Woody G."
Boyle said she learned a lot from Guthrie and believes in promoting his music, and although he was not a provider, she shared part of her life with a wildly unique man.
"I don't regret it. But I wouldn't live it over. You have to take each day for itself," said Boyle.
Reach Leslie Parrilla at 951-368-9644 or lparrilla@PE.com
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