December 8 Sunday – In Riverdale, N.Y. Sam wrote to William Winter at the Staten Island Academey, N.Y., for the Arthur Winter Memorial Library. Sam declined to give a reading there, explaining it was his new rule to never do so outside the City, and only to do so in private homes, with no advertising, and for a good cause. If Winter wanted to transfer the reading to a home in N.Y.C., he would reconsider [MTP]. Note: The library was established by William and Elizabeth Campbell Winter in memory of their son Arthur, “a child of rare genius, beauty, and charm, who was once a student at the Staten Island Academy” [Library Journal, Vol. 15. Oct. 1890 p.313].

The New York Times, p.24, ran “Kossuth Celebration by Hungarians,” noting the 50th anniversary of the Hungarian patriot, Lajos Kossuth, in America. The article quoted ex mayor Abram S. Hewitt (1822-1903) ex-president Grover Cleveland, Mark Twain, Governor Benjamin B. Odell, Jr., mayor-elect Seth Low, and Senator George Frisbie Hoar of Mass. Twain wrote:

You are not wrong in divining that I hold the great name of Lajos Kossuth in honor and reverence. It is a feeling common to Americans and one which will abide and not perish.