K. Gingrich: I do because Bob said, 'Uh uh.' I mean there was too much riding on Newt even then as to what he was going to be, what he was going to do. And marrying his math teacher was not one of them. So he didn't bring her home right away. And she could talk back to Bob. And then some. And he didn't care for anything. But then later on she had Kathy and it clicked and they've become friends.

Q: How did you hear about it? Did Newt tell you?

K. Gingrich: Uh hmm. Newtie told me. And I knew there was gonna be trouble. [laughs] I just knew it. And there was. We didn't go to the wedding because Bob would not go to the wedding. He said he would drive me there and wait for me. But I couldn't go in that church without Bob. I couldn't do it . And the children that night brought me my corsage. Newtie just said that to me, that he knew I was coming, he just knew I was coming to the wedding. But I didn't make it.

But I am sorry that they divorced. I really am. Because she did put out a lot of things to help Newtie. She tutored him, she took care of the children. They managed apartments in Atlanta. And she didn't have nice furniture. She has some now. But she didn't then. I remember going to New Orleans and the end of the couch had bricks underneath it to keep it up. And we know what that's about because Bob and I went through the same thing.

But we often wonder if she would have lost some weight if it would have helped. She was quite heavy, later. But, you don't know what goes on behind locked doors. But when he called me, it was either a divorce or he was going to have a breakdown. Things had gotten that rough with him. And I know it wasn't true --that so many have repeated--that he went to the hospital where she had just been operated on for cancer with a notebook, a list of things that he had given her. Newtie wouldn't do something like that. He just wouldn't. And he said to me, 'Mother, they never say how many times I took the girls in to see their mother. You know, that would be too nice.' I know that he didn't do that.

Q: Since he's been Speaker of the House, he's gotten so much attention since he is clearly the fellow driving and animating the debate in Washington. He has also been a lightening rod for so many people. They depict him as a hard-hearted, meanspirited - blow hard basically, and arrogant and all of that. How does that ring with you?

K. Gingrich: It doesn't. Because I don't think he's any of those things. They said that the women don't like him because he won't fight their causes for them. I don't know what their causes are, but I don't know. But no, Newt has a heart as big as an apron. I always tell it to them, standing in the kitchen window, watching him walk down to school. He'd go down to the corner and one of the little neighbor's boy's kite got caught up a tree. And to this day, I can see Newtie laying down his books, climbin' up the tree to get the kite, bringin' it down to the little boy, and off he went to school. How many kids would have done that? They'd have just stood by and said, 'Too bad.' But no, they don't know him. Or they're jealous. After all, he did come up pretty fast.

Q: Sure enough did. Did you and the Colonel ever have any aspirations for Newt? Did it ever seem that he might go into the military?

K. Gingrich: He's very flat-footed and he's very near-sighted. I don't know what they would have done with him in the military. I can't see him hike. Plus at that time they had their second baby and it was pretty rough. But now, Bob might have, but he also knew Newt's standards too. So because of his eyes and his feet, you know, he wouldn't have made it.