October 28 Wednesday – Sam’s hoax, “A Bloody Massacre near Carson,” for which he received a tempest of indignation and protest, ran uncensored in the Enterprise. (Most everything local reporters wrote was uncensored.) This piece was a fiction-hoax of one Pete Hopkins, who’d gone insane and chopped up his wife and seven of his nine children with an axe and club, afterwards riding into Carson City with his throat cut from ear to ear. The story was widely reprinted [Fatout, MT Speaks 15; ET&S 1: 324-6].

October 26 Monday – The Virginia City Bulletin reported: Mark Twain and Charley Parker of the Bulletin responded to toasts to the press on the housing of the new fire engine [The Twainian, Nov.-Dec. 1948 p 4].

October 20 Tuesday ca. – Sam returned to Virginia City. He and Dan De Quille rented rooms together [MTL 1: 266]. (See Oct. 28 entry.)

October 19 Monday – Sam wrote up the Fair for the Territorial Enterprise. His article, FIRST ANNUAL FAIR OF WASHOE AGRICULTURAL, MINING AND MECHANICAL SOCIETY, was printed sometime later in October (Camfield’s bibliog. lists the print date as Oct. 20). Sections included: Triumphal Parade; Great Pantomime Speech; Races Saturday Afternoon; A Hint to Carson; and, The Fair a Success and a Valuable Lesson [Smith 80-6].

October 12 through 17 Saturday – Sam covered the First Annual Fair of the Washoe Agricultural, Mining and Mechanical Society [MTL 1: 266].

October 11 Sunday – Sam’s “The Great Prize Fight” was published in the Golden Era [Walker 24].

October 9 Friday ca. – Sam left San Francisco for Carson City.

Fall – Benson writes: “Ingomar, the Barbarian,” was presented in the opera house in the autumn of 1863. Mark Twain’s connection with this play proved of more than usual significance, because his critique was copied in the East, and we have the first instance of Eastern periodicals printing the Western writings of Mark Twain…. In this Ingomar review, Mark Twain shows a breaking away from the cruder humor that was in evidence in earlier burlesque writings. Gradually he came to depend more and more on cleverness rather than coarseness.

September 28 Monday – The location of the duel between Goodman and Fitch was kept a secret until the last so as to avoid the law preventing the contest. Sam and “Young” Wilson rode horseback out to Ingraham’s Ranch. Major George Ferrand and Cyrus Brown were seconds for Goodman; Captain Roe and Captain Fleeson served that capacity for Fitch. After shooting Fitch in the leg (rumor had it he’d announced he would not shoot above the waist), Goodman rode off at the appearance of a stagecoach. Fitch would limp for the rest of his life, but they became good friends after the duel [Mack 271-2].

September 27 Sunday – The Golden Era reprinted “Mark Twain—More of Him.” Sam added a preface to the older article, “All About the Fashions,” that ran in the Enterprise sometime between June 21 and 24. Another article by Sam appeared in the same edition of the Era, “The Lick House Ball” [ET&S 1: 313-319]. Tom Fitch of the Virginia City Union printed a challenge in that paper to Joe Goodman for a duel, to be held at Ingraham’s Ranch in Stampede Valley at 9 A.M. the next morning [Mack 271].