JACK LONDON'S FIRST LOVE

Preserved in the Bancroft Library at Berkeley is the correspondence of Blanche Partington. Jack mentioned her in 1911 and called her a friend. I was not able to find her name in reference works or in American textbooks for that time, and there was nothing about her in substantive volumes of biographies. Blanche was a journalist and a theatre reviewer for the newspaper San Francisco Call. Blanche's brother was an artist; her sister an opera singer. This girl was a member of the "crowd"—a group of creative intelligentsia called the "Bohemians of the Bay Area" (San Francisco) which also included Joaqin Miller, George Sterling and his wife Carrie, artist Xavier Martinez, the talented sportsman and journalist James Hopper, Jim Whitaker, etc. Jack and Charmian often spent time with this group.

Jack very much liked the intelligent and dynamic Blanche, who at one time was even a rival of Charmian, who became jealous. But the golden-haired Mabel had really been Charmian's main rival. My interest in the fate of the blue-eyed Mabel Applegarth, the first love of Jack, remained unsatisfied. In Russ Kingman's files there was a photo of Mabel I had not seen before he shared it with me. The original belonged to Mr. Sal Noto, a London admirer who lived in Palo Alto. He specifically studied the life of Mabel. We were acquainted by correspondence.

Mr. Noto, his wife, and I arranged to meet in Berkeley. Sal Noto had prepared an article based on reliable sources which gave a more complete picture of this girl, who led Jack to create one of the most breathless and enrapturing female characters in world literature. Mabel was born in England and was two and a half years older than Jack. Her father, a mining engineer, came to California with his family. There was employment for specialists of his kind. The father's work often kept him away from home and the educated mother looked after the children in the Victorian tradition. The Applegarth home was maintained according to the tastes of the middle class and with elements of European culture. All this fascinated Jack.

Mabel finished high school and entered the University of California in 1893. Her brother Ted introduced her to Jack, who was slightly more than 18 years old. Jack entered the university after some persuasion from Mabel and specialized in the humanities and literature, as did Mabel. However, Jack left for Alaska at the beginning of his second semester. He wrote Mabel from the Klondike.

I mentioned earlier in this book that I have an excellent picture Joan sent to me, depicting Mabel with Jack, Bessie and the dogs. This photograph was made before Jack's marriage. In the photograph given to me by Sal Noto, the young woman was depicted in full length. She was without doubt attractive, feminine, and modest as evidenced by the high collar of her blouse. Yet, in this photograph, Mabel appeared to be older. It may have been taken at the very beginning of the 1900s, when Jack was already married.

Of course, the novel Martin Eden is autobiographical to an extent, but at the same time it is not a documentary. Nevertheless, in her actions as well as in her appearance, Ruth Morse was much like Mabel Applegarth. Mabel's hair was striking golden blonde, as was Ruth Morse's. London placed the blame on Ruth for the cooling of Martin's feelings. Indeed, this was somewhat true. However, both sides were responsible for the collapse of love. The writer portrayed the heroine as pedantic, superficial, and bourgeois in everything. However, when Jack presented Mabel with a copy of Martin Eden in 1909, he asked her not to draw parallels with characters in the novel. Evidently, Mabel did not take offense, and she and Jack remained friends until the end of her days.

In 1910, Mabel and her mother accepted Jack's invitation to see the ranch. This was mentioned in the diary of Charmian, who was jealous of her husband's first love. Jack and Mabel met three years later at the film preview of "Sea Wolf." Mabel never married; she worked in several capacities. Judging by reference sources in San Jose, Mabel was active in the Unitarian Church. Her health became more and more fragile; she had a latent form of tuberculosis. In December 1913 she was hospitalized, and on February 19, 2024 she passed away. She was just over 41 years of age. Jack was in Hawaii at that time, and he would outlive Mabel by less than two years.

With Sal Noto, his wife and son, I visited the cabin transported from the Yukon to the Jack London Square in Oakland, as well as the First and Last Chance Saloon. At that time, my visit to California was coming to an end, and I had limited time left to spend at the Huntington Library. There, I hastily looked through Charmian's diaries. The acquisition of the diaries by the library had attracted the attention of researchers. We had the possibility of speaking in more detail about Jack and his wife. Strangely, poring over Charmian's notes from January 1916, I did not find a single word about Jack's upcoming birthday. On the 12th of January 1916, he turned 40, while he and Charmian were vacationing in Hawaii. How could a faithful, loving wife overlook her husband's birthday? It would be his last one alive!

Once again I was on my way back to Russia, my homeland. I took consolation in knowing that scholarly foes could not relegate Jack to the background of American literature. The books of Jack London radiated inspiring energy and helped readers find genuine values. As the famous literary expert Maxwell Geismar said of the writer, "It is impossible to drive Jack London out of the national literature. He is too powerful, too firmly entrenched in history for this, and he became very influential. He is too interesting, too attractive, and rich in facts."