Sam Clemens arrived in Cincinnati from Keokuk, Iowa in October of 1856.  He worked as a printer for T. Wrightson & Co. at 167 Walnut St.  He stayed at a boardinghouse at 76 Walnut St.  He wrote two letters to the Keokuk Post using the name Thomas Jefferson Snodgrass.  On February 16, 1857, he boarded the Paul Jones and left the city for New Orleans, where he became Bixby's cub.

He returned to the city as part of the Twain-Cable Tour, January 1885.