• October 16, 1905 Monday

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    October 16 Monday – Isabel V. Lyon wrote for Sam to Ambrose Lee, acknowledging his letter of Oct. 13. Lyon’s response is not extant but is referred to in Lee’s Oct. 18 to Sam [MTP].

    Clemens also wrote to the Congo Reform Assoc. in Boston, the letter not extant but referred to in Tyler’s Oct. 17 reply.

  • October 17, 1905 Tuesday

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    October 17 Tuesday – In Dublin, N.H. Sam wrote to John Y. MacAlister in London about the passing of Henry Irving: “All our people mourn him. He earned their love & esteem at his first coming & never lost it. He was endeared to me by a warm friendship of thirty-three years” [MTP]. Note: Sam also ordered a wreath sent to Irving’s funeral [Clara’s enclosure in Oct. 19 to MacAlister].

  • October 19, 1905 Thursday

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    October 19 Thursday – In Dublin, N.H. Sam wrote to John Y. MacAlister. Sam enclosed two letters, he’d received from Katy Leary (Oct. 18) and a partial letter from daughter Clara.

    It was most kind & thoughtful of you, & if Clara were here she would thank you, as I do—as you will see by the scrap from her letter enclosed. When your first telegram came I had already telegraphed Col. Harvey & Howells to send cables & include me. That is why I did not send a sentiment until you asked for it.

  • October 20, 1905 Friday

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    October 20 Friday – In Dublin, N.H. Sam wrote to daughter Clara.

    Clarchen dear, I wish to learn to make the right & just allowance for Jean, & to try to keep constantly in mind that she is heavily afflicted by that unearned, undeserved & hellish disease, & is not strictly responsible for her disposition & her acts when she is under its influence (if there is ever a time when she is really free from its influence—which is doubtful). She has had 2 attacks to-day.

  • October 21, 1905 Saturday

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    October 21 Saturday – As planned (see Oct. 15 and Oct. 20 to Clara; Oct. 19 to MacAlister), Sam went to stay with the Pearmain’s Back Bay, 388 Bacon St., Boston. He was telegraphed there on Oct. 25 by Miller Reese Hutchinson [MTP].

  • October 22, 1905 Sunday

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    October 22 Sunday – Sometime during Sam’s stay in Boston, he conferred with Dr. Haley; Thomas S. Barbour of the Congo Reform Assoc. (Sam was an “honorary” Vice President) wrote on Nov. 23 that he hoped Sam had a good talk with Dr. Haley, and was sorry he could not join them.

  • October 23, 1905 Monday

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    October 23 Monday – During his stay at Pearmain’s Boston home, Sam met a young Liberian, Dihdwo Twe, a sophomore at Cushing Academy in Ashburnham, Mass. Twe had been in the Congo before coming to the U.S. He would correspond with Twain into 1906 [Hawkins 170].

    Isabel Lyon’s journal # 2: “Sent MS of ‘Eve’s Diary’ to Mr. Clemens in Boston” [MTP TS 32].

  • October 24, 1905 Tuesday

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    October 24 Tuesday – Miller Reese Hutchinson sent a telegram to Sam, now at the Pearmain’s house, 388 Beacon Street, Boston : “When can you supply theatrical sketch as per letter of eleventh please answer my expense” [MTP]. Note: this Back Bay address was recently listed for sale as a multi-family house with twelve bedrooms and nine baths with nearly 11,000 square feet, built in 1900.

    Isabel Lyon’s Journal # 2: “Guest of College Club in Boston, 4. P.M.” [MTP TS 32].

  • October 25, 1905 Wednesday

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    October 25 Wednesday – In Boston, Mass. Sam wrote and directed Isabel V. Lyon to answer Miller Reese Hutchison’s Oct. 24 telegram: “Dear Miss Lyon— / Please write him I am not able to undertake it.” [MTP].

    Sam also wrote Miss Lyon to deposit $200 for daughter Clara, and that he would return to N.Y.C. the next day, expecting to be there “only a few days” [MTP].

  • October 26, 1905 Thursday

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    October 26 Thursday – The New York Times, p.1 “These are for Ivins” reported Mark Twain and 26 other notable gentlement who had “signified their intention of working for the election of Mr. Ivins”—William M. Ivins, Sr. (1851-1915), Republican candidate for mayor. Ivins ran third in the mayoral election of 1905, behind George B. McClellan, Jr. and William Randolph Hearst. Note: the Times of Oct. 22, 1905 ran a feature article on Ivins, “A Man of Many Facets.” George B. McClellan, Jr. (1865-1940), NYC Mayor (1904-1909).

  • October 27, 1905 Friday

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    October 27 Friday – At 388 Beacon St., Boston, Mass., Sam inscribed his portrait to Thomas Bailey Aldrich: “Tom Bailey Aldrich, / with the love of / Mark Twain” [MTP]. Note: Aldrich had written on the portrait, “ ‘The whole quire hold their hips, and laffe.’ ” / A Midsummer Night’s Dream. / The whole quire means all the world. / T.B. Aldrich.”

    Sam also wrote to Thomas S. Barbour, of the American branch of the Congo Reform Assoc.

  • October 31, 1905 Tuesday

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    October 31 Tuesday – At the Pearmain’s house, 388 Beacon St., Boston, Sam wrote to Frederick A. Duneka: “I was interrupted, & didn’t half read the proof of the Horse’s Tale. Will you have it done carefully? Jean goes to New York to-morrow from Dublin—I follow in a few days” [MTP]

  • November 1905

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    November – A formal invitation was sent out to be George B. Harvey’s guest at the celebration of Mr. Clemens’ Seventieth Birthday, Delmonico’s on Tuesday, Dec. 5 at 7:30 p.m. One such letter went to Louise C. Moulton [MTP].

    Sam also wrote to the Oppenheimer Institute.

  • November 1, 1905 Wednesday

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    November 1 Wednesday – Back at the Pearmain’s house, 388 Beacon Street in Boston, Mass., Sam wrote to daughters Clara and Jean.

    Dear Children, No, it’s for Jean to do, because she knows the Pearmains, & Clara doesn’t. Write Mrs. Pearmain a letter, Jean, & thank her for this house’s hospitalities to me. I have known many hosts in my time, but the Pearmains are the only perfect hosts I have known.

  • November 2, 1905 Thursday

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    November 2 Thursday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: “Mr. Clemens is staying on at the Pearmains’ and he is going to visit the Aldriches too. / I’m beginning my search for rooms” [MTP TS 109]. Note: Trombley points out that Clara insisted Miss Lyon live out of the house, as had been the arrangement when Livy was alive, so that this search for rooms was Lyon’s attempt to find herself housing [MTOW 84]. See excerpt from this source under Nov. 1.

  • November 3, 1905 Friday

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    November 3 Friday – In Boston, Mass. Sam sent a telegram to Richard Watson Gilder of Century Magazine, N.Y. “Your question just received I believe in Ivens [sic Ivins] and Jerome and hope to be allowed to vote my whole strength for them that is to say once as clemens and twice as twain” [MTP]. Note: William M. Ivins, Sr. and William Travers Jerome were running for mayor of N.Y.C. and attorney general of N.Y. County respectively. Ivins was defeated but Jerome was reelected, serving in the post from 1902 to 1909.

  • November 4, 1905 Saturday

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    November 4 Saturday – In Boston, Mass. Sam attended and spoke at the afternoon debate at the Twentieth Century Club. His speech was published by the Chicago Daily Tribune, Nov. 5, 1905, p. l.

    MARK TWAIN TALKS PEACE

    ———

    Boston. Nov. 4.—Mark Twain was the star attraction to-day at the Twentieth Century Club’s weekly debate. Dr. Benjamin F. Trueblood, secretary of the American Peace Society, and Mr. and Mrs. Edwin D. Mead, famous peace advocates, who had just returned from Europe, were the other guests of the club. Mrs. Mead and Dr. Trueblood spoke first.

  • November 5, 1905 Sunday

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    November 5 Sunday – Ruth McCall for Phi Kappa Psi, Smith College wrote to ask Sam to be their peaker at their annual open meeting [MTP].

    Mary Boyle O’Reilly (1873-1939), philanthropist and WWI correspondent, wrote on The Guild of St. Elizabeth (Boston) letterhead to ask Sam for an authographed book for their Nov. 21 fair, as he had done the year before [MTP]. Note: Clemens wrote at top: “Send 2 or 3 / Autographed / Joan of Arc / Dog’s Tale”; see also IVL journal #2 entry for Nov. 9.

  • November 6, 1905 Monday

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    November 6 Monday – Samuel W. McCall wrote to Sam [MTP]. Note: MTP dates Sam’s reply as “on or after 6 November.” Sam responded: “If I would go any where on a platform & break my pledge to myself I would go there—but I mustn’t break that pledge” [MTP]. Note: Samuel Walker McCall (1851-1923), past editor of the Boston Daily Advertiser; at this time congressman from Mass. 8 congressional district; later Gov. of Mass. (1916-1919).

  • November 7, 1905 Tuesday

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    November 7 Tuesday – At 21 Fifth Ave. in N.Y.C. Sam wrote to Alice Whittemore Pearmain

    I attended to the regime yesterday evening: a substantial dinner at 7. 30, with some deadlies (sweet things; milk & crackers when I went to bed at 10; milk when I woke at 2 a. m; milk & crackers when I woke at 5 a. m; corn bread & 3 cups of unmodified coffee at 8 a. m., (after stealing Clara’s bath, which I found prepared at 7. 30. [ ) ]

  • November 8, 1905 Wednesday

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    November 8 Wednesday – William Ten Eyck Hardenbrook wrote from N.Y.C. to Sam asking for a photograph of him for a “reference collection of portraits, with biographical data of one hundred of the most eminent living Americans.” He supplied a list of photographers who would do a sitting at no cost to Sam should he lack a photograph. On or just after this date Miss Lyon replied for Sam that he did not keep photos on hand but “9—made a good one a year ago,” probably referring to number nine on the list of photographers [MTP].

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