The Odd widowry of Wm. & Libby

Date: 1930 [unknown]
Location: [unknown]
Surname/tag: Everest, Phelps

I knew that William Everest-116 and Libby Alice Phelps-2755 had divorced I thought some time in the 1930's. I was a bit surprise to find that each claimed to be widowed on the 1930 US Census. I presume the social prohibitions on divorce were sufficient to cause each of these people to present themselves as widowed rather than divorced. Indeed, I recall that when I first became interested in genealogy in the 1960's my questions about their marital status were briefly dismissed by acknowledging that they had divorced, with further inquiries dismissed with a curt, "they just didn't get along and so they divorced."