November 19 Wednesday – In Riverdale, N.Y. Sam wrote to John M. Dickey in Indianoplis, Ind.
Dickey had evidently asked for copies of letters to and from James Whitcomb Riley the “Hoosier Poet”.
“For the admiration I have for Riley’s work, and for the affection I have for Riley himself, I wish I had the letters, then I should gladly send them. But we have been homeless for twelve years, our books and things are still warehoused in London, and without doubt the letters are there” [MTP].
In N.Y.C. William Dean Howells wrote to Sam.
The worst of a big dinner is that you don’t get at people to say needed things. I spoke to Harvey about your plan for helping poor old Charley Stoddard out, and yesterday he told me he had thought something out, and would speak to us both about it, last night. Then you got away. But he said he would let me—or you— know his scheme.
I hadn’t a word with you, and I wanted to ask you a lot of things!
Well, I shall see you next week [MTHL 2: 751]. Note: George B. Harvey, head of Harpers; Charles W. Stoddard (see Nov.16 from Howells).
David A. Munro of the North American Review wrote to Sam, enclosing a check for three Christian Science articles; the number of words “according to Mr. Franklin’s count, is in the near neighborhood of 12,400.
But I have made the cheque for 12,500…kindly sign the receipt” [MTP].
Clark B. Wakefield wrote from Denison, Texas to William Dean Howells, who then forwarded it to Sam. Wakefield thanked for encouragement of the fiction he was to write: “I do not know if I have sufficiently recovered from the receipt of your letter and that of Mr. Clemens to write an intelligent letter of thanks” [MTP]. Note: Sam wrote on the env. “From Clark Wakefield / Denison, Texas. / I think he will be heard from, yet.” See Gribben, p. 732, who calls the tale “an unprintably obscene” one that has “not survived.” Harper’s Magazine published two of Wakefield’s stories, however, “Fate and the Circus,” in Jan. 1905, p.325, and “The Widow Preble” in July, 1905, p.317.