In the spring of 1869, Mark Twain became associated with the Boston Lyceum Bureau, recently established by James Redpath. He promised Redpath ten nights in the state of New York, "provided the towns were close together, but for the most part intended to accept engagements only in the six New England states." In August, after purchasing a partnership in the Buffalo, New York Express, he attempted to cancel all engagements. Redpath refused. Finally, the tour "ranged up and down the coast from Maine to Washington D.C. and throughout New York State and eastern Pennsylvania. And since Redpath had managed to book many of the lectures with Boston as a hub, Mark Twain was able to maintain his room at Young's Hotel and return there almost nightly to be with friends and spend pleasant hours visiting in Redpath's bureau. What pleased him no less was the fact that the tour included nearly all the large cities in the entire area." (Lorch pp 99, 103, 105).
December 25 Saturday – Christmas – Sam wrote from Boston to Livy wishing her a happy Christmas.
“I shall expect a letter in the loved & familiar hand in New Haven day after tomorrow, though—& a month after that, we shall close our long correspondence, & tell each other what our minds suggest, by word of mouth. Speed the day!” [MTL 3: 435].
December 27 Monday – Sam lectured (“Savages”) in Music Hall, New Haven, Conn. [MTL 3: 416].
Sam wrote from New Haven to Livy just before the lecture.
“I stopped two hours in Hartford today & Twichell & I bummed around together…Twelve thousand copies of the book sold this month. This is perfectly enormous. Nothing like it since Uncle Tom’s Cabin, I guess” [MTL 3: 440].
December 28 Tuesday – Sam wrote from New York to Joseph Twichell sending him a rail ticket he didn’t need. He also wrote to Elisha Bliss, about sending Dan Slote more books at a discount to sell to his friends.
In the evening, Sam lectured (“Savages”) in Taylor Hall, Trenton, New Jersey [MTL 3: 441-3].
December 29 Wednesday – Sam lectured (“Savages”) in Opera House, Newark, N.J. [MTL 3: 416].
“An Indignant Rebuke,” an unsigned article attributed to Sam, was printed in the Buffalo Express [McCullough 120].
The Boston Evening Transcript ran a letter by Sam about pretentious Americans, returning from Europe:
December 30 Thursday – Sam lectured (“Savages”) in Landmesser Hall, Wilkes-Barre, Pa. [MTL 3: 416].
“The Hyenas,” an unsigned article attributed to Sam, was printed in the Buffalo Express [McCullough 121].
December 31 Friday – Sam telegraphed Whitelaw Reid on or about this day. The dispatch is not extant but mentioned in Reid’s letter of Jan. 1, 1870.
Sam lectured (“Savages”) in Opera House, Williamsport, Pennsylvania [MTL 3: 416].
Sam Sues Webb – Finishes Lecture Tour – Sam & Livy Married “Sammy in Fairy Land” - Buffalo Express – Jervis Falls to Cancer – Galaxy Articles – Langdon Clemens Born - Emma Nye Dies at Clemens’ Home – Diamond Plans
1870 – Paine says that “as early as 1870 he [Sam] had jotted down an occasional reminiscent chapter” for what would become his autobiography [MTA 1: vi n1]. Of these, Paine includes “The Tennessee Land,” written this year [3-7].
January 1 Saturday – Sam wrote from Elmira to George L. Hutchings about Trenton’s True American printing a lengthy synopsis of Sam’s Dec. 28 lecture. Sam hated it when newspapers did that; he imagined that people would not go to his lectures if they could read them in the papers. He sent Hutchings his apology for being upset by being shown the synopsis [MTL 5: 685].
January 4 Tuesday – Sam and Livy traveled thirty miles east of Elmira where Sam lectured (“Savages”) in Wilson Hall, Owego, New York. They returned to Elmira that evening [MTL 4: 5n2].
January 5 Wednesday – Sam left at 8 PM and traveled overnight by train from Elmira to New York City [MTL 4: 2n1, 3].
January 5-6 Thursday – Clemens wrote a sketch unpublished until 2009: “Interviewing the Interviewer” [Who Is Mark Twain? xxiv].
January 6 Thursday – Sam wrote at 9 AM from Dan Slote’s in New York to Livy.
“The Amenia train has been changed to 3.30 instead of 4, PM., & so it is just right. I can arrive there at 7.21, whoop my lecture & clear out again.”
He’d been reading Robinson Crusoe and kept losing the book. “It is just like me. I must have a nurse” [MTL 4: 1].
January 7 Friday – In the wee hours after midnight, Sam wrote from Amenia, New York to Mary Mason Fairbanks.
January 8 Saturday – At midnight in the Troy House, Troy, New York, Sam wrote to Livy. He wrote her a second letter later in the day. His second letter marveled at the insignificance of the earth in the universe and of man. “Does one apple in a vast orchard think as much of itself as we do?” Sam was reading “The Early History of Man” in Eclectic Magazine for Jan. 1870 [MTL 4: 12].
Sam also wrote his agent, James Redpath, of “one-horse” towns, bills, and the like.
January 10 Monday – At noon, Sam wrote from Albany New York to Livy, apologizing for his Owego lecture she had attended. The reviews were good, however. “What an eternity a lecture-season is!” Sam wrote that he was reading Ivanhoe. “He is dead, now” [MTL 4: 15-16].
That evening he lectured (“Savages”) in Tweddle Hall, Albany. Afterward in bed he wrote again to Livy. “Had an immense house, tonight, little sweetheart, & turned away several hundred—no seats for them” [MTL 4: 17].
January 11 Tuesday – Sam lectured (“Savages”) in Union Place Hall, West Troy, New York.
Note: Sam’s next two letters to Livy, No.s 174-5, after West Troy and Rondout lectures are lost [MTL 4: 20n10].
January 12 Wednesday – Clemens lectured (“Savages”) in Rondout, New York.
January 13 Thursday – Sam wrote from Cambridge, New York to Livy about quitting smoking—did she really want him to?
“I shall treat smoking just exactly as I would treat the forefinger of my left hand: If you asked me in all seriousness to cut that finger off…I give you my word I would cut it off” [MTL 4: 21]. Note: Presented in this way, how could Livy ask Sam to quit smoking?
In the evening, Sam lectured (“Savages”) in Hubbard Hall, Cambridge, New York [MTPO].
January 14 Friday – Sam lectured (“Savages”) in Mechanic’s Hall, Utica, New York [MTPO].
Sam wrote from Troy, New York to Livy. Neither poor weather nor a fire in the lecture hall stopped Sam from his lecture. He was upset that the Troy Daily Times had published his Cambridge lecture of the night before. At 7 a fire broke out in the lecture hall.
January 15 Saturday – Sam wrote after midnight from the Baggs Hotel in Utica, New York to Livy [Powers, MT A Life 280].
“We had a noble house to-night (Oh, it is bitter, bitter cold & blustery!)—the largest of the season, they believe, though they cannot tell till they count the tickets to-morrow.”
Sam also wrote his sister, Pamela. He’d sent money for her and Annie to come for his wedding, plus support money for his mother, whom he did not want making the trip during the winter.
January 17 Monday – Sam lectured (“Savages”) in Baldwinsville, New York [MTPO].
January 18 Tuesday – Sam lectured (“Savages”) in Ogdensburg, NY [MTPO]. He left Buffalo at 4 PM
January 19 Wednesday – Sam lectured at the Normal School Chapel, Fredonia, New York [MTPO]. The Fredonia Censor reported on Jan. 26 of this lecture:
January 20 Thursday – Sam lectured (“Savages”) in Hornell Library, Hornellsville, New York. Sam wrote before the lecture from Hornellsville to Livy.
January 21 Friday – Sam lectured (“Savages”) in Institute Hall, Jamestown, New York, and immediately made the trip to Elmira to prepare for his wedding [MTL 4: 33n1]. Note: Reigstad writes that the tour “ended with a whimper. / He admitted to being tired for his last lecture stop, and the Jamestown Journal reports were unflattering” [93]. During the three-month lecture tour, Clemens sent over 20 stories to the Buffalo Express [94].